Digital Editions Still Make Up Only a Tiny Fraction of Magazine Sales

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By Lauren Indvik2013-08-06 17:06:52 UTC

While newsstand sales continue to tumble, down another 10% for the first half of the year, magazines continue to see rising demand for their digital editions.

According to the Alliance for Audited Media, in the first half of 2013, magazines distributed 10.2 million digital editions collectively, nearly double the number circulated in the first half of 2012. Still, digital editions account for only a fraction — 3.3% — of total circulation, leaving many publishers disappointed that the iPad and other tablets haven't done more to help their businesses at a time when newsstand and print adverting sales (fashion category excepted) are particularly adverse.

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The numbers are worse the closer you look. While 10.7 million is the total number of digital editions distributed over the six-month period, that average is heavily skewed by top seller Game Informer Magazine, which circulated nearly 3 million copies over that period. Number two, Reader's Digest, sold approximately 292,00 copies. Number five, National Geographic, sold around 180,000.

Meanwhile, ad sales in digital editions are up 25% in the first half of the year, though the numbers suggest that digital ads are bringing in only a fraction of the dollars that print ads do, largely because they're reaching a much smaller audience.

Image: TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images and AAM

Topics: Business, magazines, Media