Guardian Australia has recorded its biggest month for reader support, bringing in more than $2.3 million in November – surpassing the previous high, set during the May 2025 federal election month, by more than 7 per cent.
The milestone has been fuelled by reader response to Guardian Australia’s annual end-of-year supporter appeal, which kicked off on 1 November and reached its initial $800,000 target on 6 December, several weeks ahead of expectation. Given the momentum, Guardian Australia has announced a stretch goal of $1.2 million, which it aims to reach by 31 December. The target reflects the dollar value of new acts of support from Australian readers during the campaign period – both one-off contributions and sign-ups to yearly or monthly recurring support.
More than 9,000 acts of support were made in November alone, including some 5,000 single contributions – the value of which was the most since January 2020 – and 4,000 new monthly or annual recurring supporters and subscribers. The combined Australian and New Zealand recurring supporter base has now passed 163,000. Globally, the Guardian now has more than 1.4m recurring digital supporters and has grown reader revenue by 20 per cent year-over-year.
This year’s appeal has centred on the mounting pressures facing independent journalism, including mis- and disinformation, the dominance of big tech platforms, the growing headwinds confronting traditional advertising models, and the spectre of AI chatbots severing the link between readers and original journalism. It has also highlighted the Guardian’s unique reader-funded structure, protected by the Scott Trust, which ensures the organisation’s editorial independence in perpetuity and allows its journalism to remain open and accessible to all.
Alongside these themes, the appeal has celebrated the impact of Guardian Australia’s reporting in 2025 – from agenda-setting investigations such as Broken Trust and The Descendants, to deep coverage of climate, culture and politics.
