Russia news, front pages compared
Crosswire tracks 6 major Russia news outlets. Preview their homepages side by side below — switch between two, three and four columns, go compact, or translate every page into your language. Or jump straight to a curated comparison by political leaning.
The Russia media landscape on Crosswire
Crosswire lays Russia's front pages next to one another so you can see which stories lead where, how headlines are framed, and what one outlet foregrounds that another leaves out. The 6 titles tracked here span the spectrum — 1 we place on the left, 2 near the centre and 3 on the right — so a comparison can genuinely cross editorial lines rather than sampling one side twice.
By kind of outlet, the 6 titles break down as 2 news agencies (TASS and RIA Novosti), 1 business daily (Kommersant), 1 digital-native outlet (Meduza), 1 tabloid (Moskovsky Komsomolets) and 1 television news channel (RT). Crosswire lists no public-service broadcaster for Russia, so the fixed point in a comparison has to be a wire service or the most widely read daily instead. The wire services tracked here are TASS and RIA Novosti; agency copy is written to be resold across the spectrum, which makes it the plainest baseline for spotting the framing a newsroom adds on top.
Russia sits in Central and Eastern Europe, on Crosswire's Europe hub. By outlets tracked it is 7th of the 10 countries in Central and Eastern Europe and 22nd of the 45 across Europe, where the average is 5.9 outlets per country. Its neighbours in Central and Eastern Europe with hubs of their own are Poland (8), Czech Republic (6), Slovakia (6), Hungary (6), Romania (6), Bulgaria (6), Ukraine (5), Belarus (5) and Moldova (5).
Leaning groupings are approximate guides drawn from widely cited media-bias assessments — see the methodology and what the labels can and can't tell you. Counts are taken from the directory as of .
Which are Russia's main news outlets?
Across Russia's editorial spectrum, Crosswire currently lists on the left, Meduza; near the center, Kommersant and Moskovsky Komsomolets; on the right, RT, TASS and RIA Novosti. Each outlet below links to a full profile — its facts, editorial leaning and a live front-page preview — and the comparison view above shows any of them side by side.
RT, formerly Russia Today, is a Russian state-funded international television network and news website broadcasting in several languages, including English. It presents Russian government perspectives on world affairs to international audiences and has been widely criticised in Western countries as a vehicle for state messaging and propaganda.
TASS is Russia's oldest and largest news agency, owned by the Russian state. Publishing in Russian and English, it distributes domestic and international news and official statements, and generally reflects official Russian positions on political and diplomatic matters. It supplies coverage to both Russian and global audiences as a state news provider.
Kommersant is a major Russian daily newspaper and news website focused on business, finance, and politics, published in Russian. Long regarded as one of the country's leading business publications, it covers economic affairs, corporate news, and domestic and international developments.
RIA Novosti is a Russian state-owned news agency publishing primarily in Russian. Part of the state media group Rossiya Segodnya, it provides extensive domestic and international news coverage and is generally aligned with official Russian government positions. As a major state agency, it is one of the country's principal sources of breaking news.
Meduza is an independent Russian-language news outlet founded in 2014 by former Lenta.ru journalists and based in Riga, Latvia. It covers Russian politics and society critically, is generally characterized as liberal and left-of-center, and has been blocked in Russia and designated an 'undesirable organization' by Russian authorities, continuing to publish for readers inside and outside the country.
Moskovsky Komsomolets is a Moscow-based daily founded in 1919 and one of Russia's highest-circulation newspapers. Privately owned and edited since 1983 by Pavel Gusev, the tabloid mixes politics, crime, and human-interest reporting in a popular register, operating within Russian media regulations while retaining one of the largest mass readerships in the country.
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