Reuters and CNN have both announced on the same day that they will introduce a metered paywall on their websites.
Both news outlets are rolling out a digital subscription model that will see users able to read an as-yet undisclosed number of articles per month before being asked to subscribe.
CNN, currently the biggest news website in the US by visits and the third most popular in the world, said it will charge its most-regular users in the US $3.99 (£3) per month to access the full site.
The subscription will include exclusive features and documentaries, a daily curation of content, and fewer online adverts.
According to the outlet, some content will remain fully accessible including the homepage, breaking news live stories, standalone video pages and sponsored articles.
Meanwhile Reuters, currently the 30th biggest news website in the world, said full access globally to its website and newly relaunched app will cost $1 (75p) per week, or $4 per month.
Reuters president Paul Bascobert said: “This new subscription plan ensures Reuters can expand the reach of its award-winning coverage at an affordable price, while allowing us to further invest in our reporting and products for subscribers.”
Reuters will begin rolling out the digital subscription in Canada in early October before it goes to multiple countries in Europe and the US and, ultimately, all around the world.
Reuters promised that the pricing plan is “simple and transparent” with “no introductory offers or surprise price increases” and said users can “easily cancel”.
Reuters first publicly mooted the addition of an online paywall for its website in 2021 but the idea was ditched due to a dispute with financial data provider Refinitiv, a former Thomson Reuters division acquired by LSEG in 2021, over whether introducing subscriptions would breach their news supply agreement.
Reuters then raised the idea again in January 2023 after agreeing with LSEG a “path forward for Reuters to launch consumer-facing subscription products supporting both parties’ engagement with global professionals”.
Reuters owner Thomson Reuters said in August it expected to grow revenues by about 7% in 2024. The Reuters News division saw revenues grow by 13% in the first six months of the year to $415m. In Q2 its growth was put down to “growth in the agency business and by a contractual price increase from our news agreement with the data and analytics business of LSEG”.
Meanwhile at CNN revenues are challenged by its reliance on linear TV, in particular carriage fees from the cable industry.
Chief executive Mark Thompson, who joined last year and previously led the launch of the successful digital subscriptions strategy at The New York Times, said this summer that he intended to “future-proof” CNN, including by building a digital subscriptions business bringing in more than a billion dollars in revenue.
Alex MacCallum, CNN’s executive vice president of digital products and services, told staff in a memo on Tuesday that the initial offering will be expanded with “new products and businesses” to come.
“Over time, we will invest in ways to better meet our users’ needs and expand our aperture to engage and serve new audiences,” she said.
CNN’s previous attempt at a subscription-based business, its subscription service CNN+, closed after one month in April 2022. It was reported to have reached 150,000 paying subscribers.
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