Media in Toronto

The media in Toronto encompasses a wide range of television and radio stations, as well as digital and print media outlets. These media platforms either service the entire city or are cater to a specific neighbourhood or community within Toronto. Additionally, several media outlets from Toronto extend their services to cover the Greater Toronto Area and the Golden Horseshoe region. While most media outlets in Toronto cater to local or regional audiences, there are also several national media outlets based in the city that distribute their services across Canada and caters to a national audience.

Toronto is largest mass media market in Canada, and the fourth-largest market in North America, behind New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago. As a result, several Canadian media companies and conglomerates are based in Toronto.

TV stations

The incumbent cable provider in the Toronto area is Rogers Cable, which originally secured the cable franchise for most of the pre-amalgamation city of Toronto, and later purchased the systems in surrounding areas. Since 2010, Bell Fibe TV (an IPTV terrestrial service operated by Rogers' rival Bell Canada) has been available in most neighbourhoods in the Greater Toronto Area. Independent IPTV television services such as Vmedia and Zazeen have also become available.

American network affiliates on Toronto cable are piped in from Buffalo, New York, including WGRZ (NBC), WIVB-TV (CBS), WKBW-TV (ABC), WUTV (Fox), and WNED-TV (PBS). For additional fees cable subscribers can also watch WNYO-TV (MyNetworkTV) and WNLO (The CW). Many of these stations can be seen over the air throughout the Greater Toronto Area.

Toronto has seven times the population of the Buffalo market. In particular, WUTV and WNED rely heavily on viewership from Toronto; both have long identified as serving "Buffalo/Toronto," and also have sales offices in the city. More than half of WNED's members live in Toronto.

Most of Canada's over-the-air and cable television networks also have national operations based in Toronto; for more information, see List of Canadian television channels.

Radio

Toronto stations

AM

FM

Other stations

Numerous radio stations licensed to communities outside the City of Toronto are also marketed to the City of Toronto proper, as well as the rest of the Greater Toronto Area. This includes one American station.

AM

FM

Former stations

Please see former City of Toronto radio stations at the Canadian Communications Foundation.

Print

Newspapers

National dailies

• The Globe and Mail
• National Post

Local dailies

• Corriere Canadese – Italian
• Toronto Guardian – English language
• Korea Times – Korean (not to be confused with Korea Times)
• StarMetro (newspaper) – formerly Metro, Metro Today, GTA Today
• Ming Pao Daily News (明報) – traditional Chinese characters, with a moderate preference towards Cantonese in transliterations
• El Popular – Spanish
• Sing Tao Daily (星島日報) – traditional Chinese characters, with a moderate preference towards Cantonese in transliterations
• South Asian Observer CLOSED
• Today Daily news (現代日報) – traditional Chinese characters
• Toronto Star
• Toronto Sun
• World Journal (世界日報) – traditional Chinese characters, with a heavy preference towards Mandarin, especially as spoken in Taiwan, in transliterations

Alternative

• NOW Magazine — entertainment weekly

Community and weekly newspapers

Metroland Media Group is a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation which publishes the Toronto Star. Metroland publishes a series of weekly neighbourhood papers, some of which previously printed two or three times a week. They are distributed free of charge and have captured a large portion of the neighbourhood advertising flyer market. These newspapers are: Bloor West Villager, City Centre Mirror, East York/Beach Mirror, Etobicoke Guardian, North York Mirror, Parkdale-Liberty Villager, Scarborough Mirror and York Guardian.

Several independent community newspapers include the Town Crier and the Post City Magazines chain of monthly neighbourhood magazines, Beach Metro News, the Annex Gleaner, the Liberty Gleaner, West End Phoenix and the Marklander in the far west of Toronto.

Monthly broadsheet The Bulletin converted into an online-only outlet, now defunct.

L'Express and Le Métropolitain are French-language weekly newspapers.

Ethnic and multicultural newspapers

Caribbean media

• Toronto Caribbean Newspaper - Toronto's Largest Caribbean Newspaper
• The Caribbean Camera - Canada's largest newspaper on Caribbean affairs
• Caribbean Weekly - Canada's only Caribbean Entertainment newspaper
• Pride News Magazine - Canada's African and Caribbean Canadian newspaper
• Share - weekly community newspaper which has served the Black and Caribbean community in the greater Toronto area since April 9, 1978
• Vision Newspaper Canada - the double award-winning Caribbean community newspaper

Chinese media

• C C Times (加中時報) - simplified and traditional Chinese characters, with a moderate preference towards Mandarin as spoken in mainland China in transliterations; free weekly
• China Today Wen Wei Po (文匯報) - simplified Chinese characters
• Chinese Canadian Voice (社区報) - traditional Chinese characters; monthly
• Global Chinese Press (環球華報) - traditional Chinese characters; free weekly
• New Star Times (星星生活報) - traditional Chinese characters; free weekly

Latin media

• Latinos Multicultural Magazine - Bilingual (English/Spanish) Monthly Printed publication
• El Centro - Spanish weekly
• Toronto Hispano

Student newspapers

• Canadian University Press
• The Dialog - George Brown College
• East York Observer - Centennial College
• The Excalibur - York University
• The Eyeopener - Toronto Metropolitan University
• Humber Et Cetera - Humber College
• The Medium - University of Toronto
• The Newspaper - University of Toronto
• On the Record - Toronto Metropolitan University
• Senecan - Seneca College
• The Scene - Seneca College
• The Strand - University of Toronto
• The Toronto Observer - Centennial College
• The Underground - University of Toronto
• The Varsity - University of Toronto
• The Woodsworth Howl - University of Toronto

Former newspapers

• The Globe - 1844 to 1936; merged with The Mail and Empire to form The Globe and Mail
• Grip - 1873 to 1894; satirical newsweekly
• The Leader - 1852 to 1878
• The Mail and Empire - 1895 to 1936; merged with The Globe to form The Globe and Mail
• The News - 1881 to 1919; changed name to The Times in March 1919, which lasted until September of that year
• The Sentinel - 1877 to 1896; newspaper of the Orange Order
• The Star Weekly - 1910 to 1973; Sunday edition of the Toronto Star, later a weekend supplement in the Saturday Toronto Star
• The Telegraph - 1866 to 1872
• The Toronto World - 1880 to 1921; final weekday edition 9 April 1921; assets acquired by The Mail and Empire
  • Toronto Sunday World - absorbed by the Star Weekly in 1924
• Toronto Empire - 1887 to 1895; merged with The Mail to form The Mail and Empire
• The Toronto Mail - 1872 to 1895; merged with The Empire to form The Mail and Empire
• Toronto Telegram - 1876 to 1971; much of the staff then formed the Toronto Sun
• Eye Weekly / The Grid - defunct
• Toronto Special - appears defunct
• Xtra! - last print edition February 2015
• 24 Hours — ceased publishing November 27, 2017

Magazines

Online-only

Book publishers

References