According to international comparative studies, the Finnish public seems to be reasonably well informed. For instance, one study examining the connections between media systems and citizens’ awareness of public affairs cites Finland as an example of a media system characterized by a high level of both news consumption and public knowledge of current affairs (Curran et al. 2009).
Table 2. The daily reach of different media in 2008
| All | Male | Female | 10-24 | 25-44 | 45-59 | 60- | |
| Newspapers | 78 % | 77 % | 78 % | 56 % | 76 % | 86 % | 88 % |
| Television | 90 % | 91 % | 90 % | 87 % | 88 % | 93 % | 93 % |
| Radio | 74 % | 75 % | 72 % | 65 % | 75 % | 78 % | 75 % |
| Internet | 60 % | 63 % | 57 % | 76 % | 79 % | 61 % | 25 % |
Source: Finnish Mass Media 2010, p. 51.
The main evening news broadcasts of both public service broadcaster YLE and its main commercial competitor MTV3 rank among the most watched programs. At most, the main news broadcasts reach over one million viewers and over a 40 % share of total viewing during the program (Finnpanel 2010a). All leading television channels provide a steady feed of news and current affairs broadcasts during primetime, which also seems to promote a high level of “inadvertent” news exposure (see Curran et al. 2009, p. 22). In radio, YLE Radio Suomi, which broadcasts hourly news bulletins, is the most popular channel with a 38 % national listening share (Finnish Mass Media 2010, p. 88).
High newspaper readership remains one of the main characteristics of the Finnish media system. The leading newspaper Helsingin Sanomat has a circulation of 400,000 with around 950,000 daily readers. on average, Finnish people read eight different periodicals and three different newspapers (Levikintarkastus 2009). A sense of concern remains within the industry regarding young readers, among whom newspaper reading is continuing to fall. of people over 45 years of age, more than 80 percent read newspapers daily, and the average reading time is 35 minutes per day. of people under 24, only some 56 percent read newspapers daily and their average reading time is less than 15 minutes (Antikainen et al. 2010).
With up to 2 million weekly visitors, the sites of tabloid newspapers and the commercial broadcaster MTV3 are the most popular websites in Finland, ahead of Helsingin Sanomat and YLE (TNS Metrix 2010). The Internet in general is increasingly important as a source of information and news, especially among young people: in a survey conducted in 2007, the Internet was the most important source of daily news for 37 % of the people under 25, while television and newspapers clearly remain the dominant news media for older people (Karppinen et al. 2010).
Table 3. Top 12 Finnish news websites
Visitors/week Rank among all websites
| Iltalehti | 1 937 156 | 1 |
| Ilta-Sanomat | 1 823 956 | 2 |
| MTV3 | 1 722 725 | 3 |
| YLE | 1 245 148 | 6 |
| Helsingin Sanomat | 1 236 527 | 7 |
| Kauppalehti | 655 093 | 11 |
| Taloussanomat | 643 954 | 13 |
| Sub.fi | 571 855 | 15 |
| Aamulehti | 262 947 | 23 |
| Kaksplus | 245 515 | 25 |
| Nelonen.fi | 206 301 | 26 |
| Uusi Suomi | 204 722 | 27 |
Source: Finnish Mass Media 2010, 218.
