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Who reads it

People who want to know what is actually happening in Newcastle and Lake Macquarie: the council decisions, the projects reshaping the city, the budgets and the datasets, each story read from the primary document and linked to its source. They tend to read the whole thing rather than skim it. You will not get a reach figure from us that we cannot show you. Ask what the Ledger's numbers really are and we will tell you.

What the Ledger's numbers really are

You should not have to ask for this, so it is on the page. It comes from our own server logs and is regenerated rather than typed in once, which is the only way it stays honest.

Measured over the 30 days to 2026-08-27, from our own server-side logs. These are page views, not people: we run no cookies and no client-side script, so unique visitors cannot be counted and we will not quote you a number we cannot stand behind. The lower figure is the floor we are confident in. The range subtracts an estimate of our own visits, measured against staged mastheads nobody can reach.

Two ways to advertise

Clearly labelled display advertising. A slot on the page that is plainly marked and sits apart from the journalism. Your message, in your own words. It is never made to look like a story, and it has no bearing at all on what the Ledger reports.

Sponsored content. A piece with a commercial arrangement behind it, which we research and check ourselves to the same standard as everything else here, and which says plainly that it is sponsored. Claims in it still carry their source. It works when you have a real story: a service the city did not have before, a job you have actually done, something you know that a neighbour would be glad to learn. It does not work as a page of adjectives.

What we will not do

The reason a placement here reaches anyone is that the Ledger is trusted locally, so that is what we protect. No invented or paid-positive reviews. No spin dressed as reporting. No advertiser gets a say in the news, and none has asked twice. What an arrangement buys is a labelled placement, and that is the whole of it. Briefs that need us to overstate something, mislead a reader or keep an interest quiet get a polite no. In a city this size a masthead that can be bought is found out quickly, and it would take your money down with it.

Disclosure, every time

If there is a commercial arrangement behind something, we say so, in ordinary words, right where you would want to know. Readers are good at sensing a plug that has not been declared, and they hold it against the business rather than the publisher. Declared and done properly, it is worth more. The law requires it too, and we would do it anyway.

Rates and how to enquire

A sponsored piece starts at $450 and most land near $600. Not-for-profits and community groups start at $150. Anything built on a real dataset, with a chart we author and a methodology note attached, starts at $1,100, because it takes considerably longer to do properly.

If a commissioned piece is more than you want, a display box starts at $80 a month, usually lands near $120, and is taken three months at a time. Judge it against the figure further up this page rather than against what a radio buy will claim at you. It is a modest local readership that reads properly, and we would rather you priced it on that than on a number we had flattered.

Those numbers are on the page on purpose. What you are paying for is the reporting time and the checking behind a piece, and a page that stays up and keeps turning up in search long after a campaign would have finished. A rate low enough to be an impulse would bring us exactly the product plugs we turn down, and turning them down is easier when the price was never the reason. We do not price on audience and will not quote you a flattering reach figure. Ask where the Ledger is really at and we will tell you straight.

No obligation either way. The advertising enquiry form is the quickest route: a couple of lines about the business and what you are thinking, and we will reply.