The Sad State of Local News 2023

Northwestern University's The State of Local News Outlook is an interactive map which visualizes the number of surviving local newspapers in every county in the United States. On this local news map individual counties are clored to show whether the county has 0, 1 or 2 or more news outlets. The data shown on the map can also be filtered to show the number of local number of newspapers, the number of digital sites, ethnic outlets or public broadcasters.

The map is based on Northwestern University's latest annual census and report on the local news ecosystem, The State of Local News 2023. The report and the resulting map reveal that in 2023 there are now 204 counties in the US which have no newspapers, local digital sites, public radio newsrooms or ethnic publications. Another 228 counties are on the “Watch List”. These are counties that the report suggests are in danger of losing their one remaining local news source. The report also warns that "On the current trajectory, by the end of next year, the country will have lost a third of its newspapers since 2005".

According to the report geography appears to play a large role in determining where local news is thriving and where it is dying. In 'affluent cities and suburban areas' alternative news sources are emerging to fill some of the gaps left by closing local newspapers. Whereas those living in poorer, rural communities are more and more living in local news deserts. 

Wikipedia's List of Defunct Newspapers of the United States includes the names of over 1,000 newspapers which are no longer in print. Many of these papers collapsed decades ago. However a large proportion of these newspapers are victims of the accelerating loss of print newspapers over the last 20 years. The list only contains the most "notable names" of the thousands of newspapers that have closed in the US.

If you are interested in discovering which local newspapers are still active in your area then you can refer to the Newspaper Map. The map provides links to the websites of thousands of local newspapers around the world (although I'm not sure how well maintained the map is as some of the links appear to be broken).