Compiled with the help of Irene Costera Meijer and Tim Groot Kormelink, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

The Netherlands are characterised by relatively high levels of trust in news and little concern about ‘fake news’. High trust figures might be due to a media landscape in which strong public service media set the quality standard for commercial news brands.

Top Brands

Changing Media

Traditional forms of news such as TV and print have become less important in the last six years (pre-coronavirus) while online news has remained broadly flat. The smartphone is now the most popular device for digital news while the tablet is more important than in many other countries.

Trust

Trust is still relatively high in the Netherlands (4th place) by international standards with more than six in ten (61%) trusting the sources they use themselves. Public news broadcaster NOS leads the brand trust scores along with regional and local papers. Some tabloids and partisan brands have lower trust scores.