Reach cuts 160 jobs and redefines success
Press Gazette · 16 Sep 2026, 11:40 CEST · Score: 8
Reach plans a net cut of around 160 editorial jobs, closing Kent Live, Aberdeen Live and Galway Beo, and is making "active engaged time" its north star metric over page views by the end of the year.
The crux
The UK's largest commercial news publisher is formally abandoning the volume model that Google's Discover changes and AI Overviews have broken.
Sell-side read
The shift from page views to engaged time is the template other publishers will copy, and it rewrites what inventory is worth; loyalty and time spent become the sellable asset.
Watch
Whether engaged time becomes a transactable currency and how Reach's 50,000-plus subscriber base converts against the cuts.
Published: 16 Sep 2026, 11:40 CEST