Sky News is launching a paywalled app specifically for defence and security content.
The Sky News Defence app is part of the news provider’s plan announced in January 2025 to become a “premium video-first newsroom built for the digital future”, with less of a focus on live, breaking TV news, by 2030. Paid podcasts are also in the pipeline to launch in the summer.
Comcast committed to continue funding Sky News at the rate of around £100m a year and protect editorial independence until 2028 when it bought Sky in 2018.
Sky News bosses have been considering how to introduce paid content for the first time since last year. A price has not yet been set for the new app.
Andy Thomson, executive director of business operations at Sky News, told Press Gazette: “We are looking at how we ultimately drive and create a long-term sustainable future for Sky News, underpinned by brilliant editorial, brilliant technology and great commercial outcomes.
“So when we think about that vision and how we show up for our audiences and our consumers, we’re quite excited about doing new, additive things that fit with the overall ethos of what we’re up to.
“This is an example of us starting to move into places where we think we’ve got a real authority and voice and distinction that ultimately consumers will engage with.”
Thomson added that the app is “playing to some of the themes that sit within 2030 about how do we move towards deeper, richer community building and starting to have a much more one-on-one relationship with the audiences, as opposed to that broad reach proposition”.
Thomson told Press Gazette that a paid podcast offering is also likely to launch this summer, with perks including bonus episodes, ad-free listening, newsletters and first access to live event tickets.
[Read more: Why The Economist has put its podcasts behind a paywall]
Sky News Defence, which will sit alongside the main Sky News free app, will feature deeper analysis, explainers and long-form journalism from security and defence editor Deborah Haynes, military analyst Michael Clarke and other contributors. It will be “very video-focused”, Thomson said, but not exclusively so.
He said the app is “very well set up to allow for that two-way community building aspect of this” as it contains Q&A and commenting features.
It was soft-launched at the London Defence Conference last week, allowing attendees to try it for free and share feedback. The official launch will come in the summer.
Thomson said the main audience is likely to be subject matter experts including professionals, policymakers and academics.
He noted that The Wargame from Sky News and Tortoise, which imagined how a Russian attack on the UK could play out and was highly commended for Innovation of the Year at the British Journalism Awards in December, reached “big audiences” and suggested there is “an interested community of broader public who would come to us for this”.
Thomson said Sky News Defence would allow the newsbrand to “test and learn” around the premium video concept and how consumers interact with it.
“It will be good in its own right, but I also think we’ll learn a huge amount as we continue to refine and adapt and grow the broad 2030 vision,” he said.
Sky News has signed a multi-year agreement with Noosphere to build the app, the tech provider’s first major enterprise deal with an international newsroom.
Noosphere launched its own paid-for app last year which consolidates video, audio and written content from various independent journalists.
CEO and founder Jane Ferguson, a former foreign correspondent for PBS, said the Sky News partnership “shows how established newsrooms are embracing a creator-led model that pairs the trust and rigour of newsroom talent with direct audience relationships”.
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