Just one in every three people said they trusted the media in general - a slight fall from last year. Photo: Supplied / Stuff / NZ Herald / Newsroom / ODT / TVNZ
Trust in the news media appears to be stabilising after five years of sharp decline.
The Trust in News in Aotearoa New Zealand report is done annually by Auckland University of Technology's Research Centre for Journalism, Media and Democracy.
Just one in every three people said they trusted the media in general - a slight fall from last year.
But when asked about individual news brands, all showed an increase.
In 2025, RNZ was perceived as the most trusted news brand, the Otago Daily Times was rated a close second, and TVNZ and NBR received the third highest trust scores.
The latest report, which surveyed just more than a thousand adults in mid February, said 45 percent of people now trust the news they choose to consume - unchanged from last year.
Co-author Dr Greg Treadwell said the media had done a good job turning things around since the pandemic when "half truths and bare-faced lies" were spread about journalists and news organisations.
RNZ chief executive and Editor-in-Chief Paul Thompson said recognition as the country's most trusted news brand was an important achievement but it hadn't happened by chance.
"[It] rather reflects RNZ's strategic focus to improve trust through initiatives that reinforce our role to serve the public through delivering reliable and trustworthy information to all New Zealanders.
"Among a range of initiatives, we've appointed a Director of Editorial Quality and Training, committed to publishing a review of an aspect of our editorial policy each year and established a new board committee focused on editorial policy and quality."
The work on trust had only just begun, he added.
"Over the next year we plan to go further in how we explain our processes to audiences, invest in journalism and continue to grow our content sharing and collaboration to help what we do reach more New Zealanders than ever. Shortly, we will also publish our own research that looks more closely at what drives people's trust or otherwise in media."
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