Digital news traffic in Nigeria fell by 26.2% over the past year, one of the most striking findings unveiled on Thursday at the launch of the Ranked 2026 report, as experts warned that audience behaviour is changing faster than many publishers expected.
The annual report, launched by SquirrelPR, now tracks digital media performance across 13 African countries, up from five markets last year.
It examines traffic, trust signals, audience behaviour, search influence and platform authority across the continent.
Speaking at the launch of the Ranked 2026 report, Jonah Solomon, co-founder and chief executive officer of SquirrelPR, said the project began after an overseas user asked a question about which Nigerian journalists should receive a press release.
“When we started Ranked report, it was after we launched SquirrelPR, and a user overseas called us and said, I see over 1000 journalists on this platform, but who should I send my release to in Nigeria?”
He said what began as a manual solution later became a structured ranking product first focused on Nigeria before expanding across Africa.
“We started with Nigeria and when we rolled it out, we realised that the publishers themselves found it more valuable than even the PR managers were targeting.”
This year’s edition covered Nigeria, South Africa, Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Democratic Republic of Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal and Tunisia, among others.
Traffic Falling, Influence Shifting
Presenting the keynote address, Keni Akintoye, CEO and lead strategist at KT Communications, said the media industry must stop relying only on traffic numbers to judge success.
“For years, we understood digital media performance through a familiar lens, which is traffic, reach impressions, bounce rates,” he said.
“But today, the signals are different.”
Akintoye said audiences now consume information through search summaries, social feeds, aggregated platforms and algorithmic recommendations, usually without visiting the original publisher’s website.
“The consuming content, forming opinions, doing all they used to do without arriving at the source.”
He added that influence has not disappeared, but moved.
“It is no longer who publishes. It is who is believed.”
According to him, credibility is becoming more valuable than clicks in an era impacted by artificial intelligence and fragmented attention.
“The future of African media will not be defined by who is loudest. It will be defined by who is most intentional.”
What the Data Showed
Solomon said the Ranked 2026 report used 12 months of historical data sourced from Similarweb, Ahrefs, Google Analytics, Google Trends and other tools.
A total of 131 news platforms were tracked. Across Nigeria, combined traffic dropped from more than one billion visits to 769 million visits.
He said the decline should not be seen as newsroom failure.
“It simply means that the audiences have moved upstream, and you need to find out how to reach them.”
He added that domain authority, a measure of how trusted and established a website is in search ecosystems, was stronger and more stable than traffic, making it a more reliable indicator of influence.
“Traffic becomes less reliable, then Domain Authority has emerged as the most consistent indicator of influence.”
The report also found that several major Nigerian publishers now receive a notable share of traffic from outside the country, while entertainment and cultural sites continue to attract stronger local audiences.
Nigeria Category Leaders
In entertainment and lifestyle, leading names included Google, BellaNaija and other established outlets.
In technology media, Techpoint Africa was the traffic leader, followed by TechCabal and emerging platforms such as TechNext and Techeconomy.
In business and finance, Nairametrics led.
For general news and current affairs, Vanguard topped traffic rankings, ahead of Punch, Legit, Sahara Reporters and The Nation.
SquirrelPR 2.0 Unveiled
The event also featured the launch of SquirrelPR 2.0, a rebuilt version of the company’s communications platform.
James Ezechukwu, co-founder and chief technology officer, said the upgraded system now includes an AI press release generator, language translation tools, media discovery, instant journalist messaging, project management functions and client management features for PR agencies.
“Our goal as SquirrelPR is to be the core operating system for PR in Africa,” he said.
The company also introduced a monitoring solution designed to help organisations track media mentions and public conversations in real time.
The event, which was planned for 60 attendees, had guest registrations exceeding 80, showing an increasing interest in data-led communications and media intelligence.
Closing the event, Ezechukwu said: “The reward for good work is more work.”
