How the audiences of 30 major news sources differ in their levels of education – Pew Research Center

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The American audiences of 30 prominent news sources vary dramatically in their levels of education, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey.
Roughly six-in-ten U.S. adults (62%) who say they regularly get news from The Atlantic have at least a bachelor’s degree. Axios, NPR and The New York Times also have audiences with relatively high levels of formal education: More than half of adults who regularly get news from these outlets have a college degree. Overall, 36% of all U.S. adults are college graduates.
By comparison, Univision and Telemundo – the two major Spanish-language TV networks included in our survey – have the lowest percentages of college graduates in their audiences at 15% and 16%, respectively. Most Americans who regularly get news from these outlets are Hispanic, and Hispanic adults in the United States are less likely to have a college degree than U.S. adults overall (20% vs. 36%).
Pew Research Center conducted this analysis as part of a larger study tracking news consumption and trust across a wide range of news sources.
We regularly ask people about their news habits on various platforms (e.g., television, print, radio and digital) and their levels of trust in information from social media and national/local news organizations in general. This study was designed to be more specific, looking at Americans’ familiarity with, usage of and views toward 30 individual news sources.
For this analysis, we surveyed 9,482 U.S. adults from March 10 to 16, 2025. Everyone who took part in the survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), a group of people recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses who have agreed to take surveys regularly. This kind of recruitment gives nearly all U.S. adults a chance of selection.
Interviews were conducted either online or by telephone with a live interviewer. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other factors. Read more about the ATP’s methodology.
Here are the questions used for this analysis, the topline and the survey methodology.
For a full breakdown of education levels within the audience of each news source, refer to this detailed table.
We selected 30 news sources based on a variety of measures, including audience size and previous survey results. We also wanted to prioritize a range of news sources across different platforms, as well as both legacy news outlets and nontraditional news sources, all while keeping the list from becoming too long for survey respondents. This selection process is not perfect; we acknowledge that no list of 30 sources could represent the entirety of today’s diverse and changing media environment. We believe this group of 30 provides an appropriate snapshot of media brands to help us study Americans’ changing news habits. To learn more, read the FAQ and methodology.
When it comes to major broadcast TV networks, about three-in-ten U.S. adults who regularly get news from NBC News (32%), ABC News (31%) and CBS News (30%) are college graduates. This is just below the national level of U.S. adults with bachelor’s degrees. These three networks are all among Americans’ most common sources of news, according to our survey.
CNN and Fox News also rank among the nation’s most popular news sources. CNN’s audience has a similar percentage of college graduates (38%) as U.S. adults overall, while Fox News has a somewhat lower share (27%).
Related: 6 facts about Fox News
A few other news sources with predominantly Republican audiences – including the Tucker Carlson Network, Newsmax and The Joe Rogan Experience – have similar shares of regular news consumers who are college graduates as Fox News.
Republican voters are generally less likely than Democratic voters to have a college degree. But these differences in audiences’ educational levels aren’t just the result of partisan preferences for different outlets. Even within each party, the audiences of various news sources have widely different levels of educational attainment. For example, Republicans who regularly get news from The Wall Street Journal are much more likely to have a college degree than Republicans who regularly get news from CBS News.
For more information about the audiences of these news sources, refer to our News Media Tracker. For a full breakdown of education levels within the audience of each news source, refer to this detailed table.
Note: Here are the questions used for this analysis, the topline and the survey methodology.
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Mary Randolph is an intern focusing on news and information research at Pew Research Center.
Michael Lipka is an associate director focusing on news and information research at Pew Research Center.
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ABOUT PEW RESEARCH CENTER Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan, nonadvocacy fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It does not take policy positions. The Center conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, computational social science research and other data-driven research. Pew Research Center is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts, its primary funder.
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