This week, we’re looking at what the next generation of news consumers actually wants — and what that means for publishers trying to reach them.
Earlier this year at the Google Publisher Summit in Austin, I had the pleasure of listening to Jeremy Gilbert from Northwestern University’s Medill School and Lamberto Lambertini of FT Strategies as they discussed findings from their new report, Next Gen News 2.
The report examines how young audiences navigate an overwhelming information environment and what they expect from the news organizations they choose to trust.
Their presentation was one of those rare sessions that felt both clarifying and challenging: clarifying in its diagnosis of why younger audiences feel disconnected from traditional news and challenging in its call for newsrooms to rethink long-held assumptions about tone, frequency and authority.
So we asked Gilbert to go deeper.
Your research shows that young people feel overwhelmed by the amount of news coming at them, but they still want quick, easy ways to stay informed. From what you’ve seen, what are some simple steps newsrooms could take to reduce that friction?
To help next gen news consumers who feel overwhelmed with information, journalists need to:
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publish less frequently, or curate more carefully so that next-gen consumers have less to filter through,
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make what they publish more engaging, and
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accept that not every successful news engagement leads young news consumers to news apps or sites.
Young news consumers need to know that the stories a news organization chooses to share are the most important. Too much coverage is a cognitive burden.
You found that younger audiences tend to trust people they know — or feel like they know — more than traditional news brands. Based on your findings, what are some ways established newsrooms can start to build that kind of trust?
News organizations need to allow their staff to develop individual voices. Next-gen audiences are put off by bland neutrality and maybe even a little suspicious of it.
Empowering individuals risks that they might leave the news organization and take their audience with them. That means news organizations must do a better job of highlighting their organizational value; emphasizing editing; legal support; and, in the U.S., insurance and retirement accounts. News organizations also need to explore partnerships with established creators outside of journalism. These partnerships should benefit both sides: creators always need more content, and publishers can build brand awareness with new audiences.
Young audiences say they see the value of news, but they’re often frustrated with how it’s delivered. From your research, what are one or two long‑standing newsroom habits that might be pushing them away?
News organizations need to be more comfortable with less formal language. Many audiences of all ages mistrust elites. Young news consumers want someone who writes or talks authentically.
During your Google Publisher Summit presentation, you talked about how many creators are breaking the traditional publishing process — in some cases fully flipping it upside down. Can you walk us through what that new approach looks like and why it resonates?
Next-gen producers have found success flipping the traditional publishing process because new formats, especially short video, use the “native language” young news consumers speak fluently. These consumers recognize when information is repurposed without attention to those styles and patterns, and it’s a turnoff. Next-gen producers explained that their work comes out best when starting with “what works” in a particular format and letting that guide content selection and how the various pieces of a story will come together.
You also mentioned that younger audiences use a set of “clues” — including things like spelling and grammar — to judge whether something is legitimate. I loved the idea that this generation has such a strong sense of media literacy. How does that play into the way they decide what and whom to trust?
Many young news consumers describe having some form of media literacy training in school. It imbues them with a healthy skepticism of mis- and disinformation. News producers need to overcome that by producing quality reporting and being honest when they get something wrong.
Our local newsrooms are actively testing many of these ideas — from format changes to new ways of building trust.
What’s working in your newsroom?
Email us at info@asunewswell.org to share your experiments, challenges or wins — we’d love to highlight what others are learning.
This update appeared in our July 1, 2026, newsletter. This version has been lightly edited for clarity.