The BMJ 2025: fortnightly in print, daily online
BMJ 2024; 387 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.q2701 (Published 05 December 2024) Cite this as: BMJ 2024;387:q2701
The BMJ will be 185 years old in 2025. It is not a notable anniversary, but it will be a momentous one. We will cease to be a weekly publication in print. The BMJ was the first weekly medical journal to move online in 1995.1 Then, deputy editor Tony Delamothe explained to readers that “The internet is a global network of computers that allows communication among its estimated 30 million users.” The internet arrived with predictions of the demise of print. However, predictions about the future of publishing, such as the death of research journals, tend to be greatly exaggerated.2The BMJ in print has remained remarkably robust. But we have continued to monitor closely the viability of weekly print, and we now believe that the time is right to move to fortnightly print publication, which means we will publish the print edition every two weeks.
The decision makes sense for several reasons. The print edition is a selected digest of our much greater output online.3 Our website, bmj.com, is visited by over two million users a month, where the biggest audience is in North America, followed closely by the UK, and then the rest of Europe, with growing readership in other territories. In 2008 the online articles became the canonical version for purposes of indexing—so what is published on bmj.com is included in the scientific record. We publish online when content is ready, and new articles are published every weekday.
The print edition is sent almost exclusively to BMA members, who receive it as a member benefit, and is therefore tailored for a UK readership. BMA members also have free access to bmj.com. The BMJ Group, which publishes The BMJ, our stable of over 60 medical journals, BMJ Learning, and BMJ Best Practice, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the BMA. This means that, although The BMJ has editorial freedom, the BMA agrees financial targets for the BMJ Group and receives an annual dividend payment.4
Shifting behaviour
It is no great revelation to say that the way our readers consume information is changing. Although The BMJ’s print circulation is around 130 000, higher than that of some Sunday newspapers, print is clearly less important to younger readers. It seems unlikely that those reading habits will change later in people’s careers. While print readership remains high, digital transformation is a global publishing phenomenon, and digital media are now too entrenched and intoxicating. In the UK, we will be joining Private Eye and the London Review of Books as a fortnightly print magazine.
Surveys and feedback tell us that the print journal is well liked, even loved, by those who read it, and our readership still includes a substantial number of senior and older doctors who rely more on print than early career doctors. However, The BMJ’s print readers of all ages tell us that the frequency of a weekly print publication can be overwhelming. Readers talk of their “pile of shame” or the next issue arriving before they’ve read the previous one. As an editorial team that is only too aware of the problems of information overload and the information paradox,5 we entirely empathise. The notion of a fortnightly print journal was generally met with approval in our online survey, and in responses that were sent directly to us, after we announced we were considering the move.6
We also empathise with readers’ concerns about the climate and sustainability, and many of you have told us that distributing a weekly print edition sits at odds with The BMJ’s activism on the climate and the activism of many of our readers. As a publishing group we have signed up to the UK Health Alliance on Climate Change’s commitments, including a target of achieving net zero for carbon emissions by 2040—if not earlier.7 Moving to fortnightly print will contribute substantially to achieving our target. The fortnightly print edition will include more pages than the current weekly print edition, but overall we will publish fewer pages a year.
Remaining a trusted source
In addition to reasons of environmental sustainability and readers’ preferences, commercial arguments are also compelling. Two decades ago, our weekly print edition was packed with advertising for products and jobs. Both these revenue streams have since declined. The economics of a weekly print edition no longer seem robust, particularly since postage and distribution costs have risen faster than inflation in recent years.
In Mirror of Medicine: A History of the BMJ, published to commemorate The BMJ’s 150th anniversary, Stephen Lock, then editor of The BMJ, describes the importance of a journal’s firm financial footing in protecting its editorial independence and therefore its influence and impact.8 Our purpose is to create a better, healthier world that prioritises outcomes related to health and wellbeing for people and the planet. In a world of lost trust in information providers, we seek to be a trustworthy source of journalism, comment, education, and research.91011121314 We will hold firm to being the mirror of medicine and championing a healthier world.
Our mix of content streams is unique among scientific journals, and we believe that by shifting more editorial and publishing time and resources to bmj.com we can maximise the opportunities that multimedia, social media, and artificial intelligence now offer for the benefit of our UK and international readers. Expect bmj.com to evolve both in features and in look and feel for an enhanced experience. We will continue to aggregate content every week for our “This Week in The BMJ” email and our BMJ app. Our fortnightly print edition will, meanwhile, see a shift in the balance of content towards some longer pieces, more short summaries, and a greater focus on clinical, educational, and research content. Obituaries, of course, will continue their relentless march.
Moving to fortnightly print allows us to do all of this while producing the familiar, appreciated, high quality journal that readers receive in print. From the first issue of 2025, we will be fortnightly in print and remain daily online. After the launch of bmj.com in 1995, this change in print frequency will be the second biggest transformation in the history of The BMJ. We hope you will understand, stay with us, and continue to enjoy and value The BMJ, be it in print, online, or, as the 21st century will have it, on socials. The future is hard to predict. This might be the first step in eventually moving to a monthly print edition or to online only. Alternatively, the fortnightly print edition might still be thriving when The BMJ reaches its double century.