The gender gap in online newsrooms
Only 27% of the 171 top editors across 240 online news brands are women despite that, on average, 40% of journalists in the 12 markets are women. This is a small increase from 2024, when the figure was 24% across the same markets, according to a survey released prior to International Women’s Day by Reuters Institute. Among 32 new top editors appointed this year and last, 11 (34%) are women.
In ten countries investigated for six years, ten markets where we have collected data for six years, the percentage of women among the top editors has changed from 23% in 2020 to 28% in 2025.
In all 12 markets, the majority of top editors are men, including in countries where women outnumber men among working journalists.
“The percentage of women in top editorial positions varies significantly from market to market, from 7% in South Korea to 46% in the UK#, the report says.
“This year the UK has overtaken the US, and is, for the first time, the country in our sample with the highest share of women top editors, while the US, following its third consecutive decrease, is now tied in second place with South Africa.”
In nine out of 12 markets there are lower percentages of women in top editorial roles than women working as journalists.
“Looking more broadly at gender equality in society and the percentage of women in top editorial positions, we find no correlation. It continues to be the case that many countries that score well on the United Nations Gender Inequality Index have relatively few women among the top editors.”
“There is notable variation in the percentage of online news users in each market who say they get news from one or more major outlets with a woman as the top editor (whether online or offline). This ranges from, at the high end, 74% in Finland and Hong Kong to, at the low end, 23% in Mexico.”
While the percentage of women in top editorial positions has increased relative to 2020 in six countries, it has decreased in South Africa (47% to 38%) and South Korea (11% to 7%), and to a lesser extent in the United States (41% to 38%) and Brazil (22% to 21%).
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