What’s Working With Local Content in 2026 (and Why You Should be Paying Attention)

Aligned with our mission to help support local newsrooms, each week, the Stacker newswire publishes local content, predominantly series tailored to each U.S. state and metro area. (Think: Cities with the fastest-growing home prices in the [metro] area.) A few months into the year, some patterns are emerging about what’s working especially well on the local front.

From what we’re seeing, broader-interest, state-level stories have a higher ceiling, at times reaching up to four times the audience of metro-level pieces. However, the latter tends to drive more consistent traffic overall when given a service angle.

Here’s what’s hitting now, what we anticipate will resonate this spring (based on current trends and Q2 2025 data), and why this matters.

Winter standouts

• Movie and TV show casting calls in [metro] is consistently at the top
  • This series runs weekly, but it comes across as fresh, not fatiguing thanks to new listings in each iteration.
  • It hits a sweet spot. There’s buzz about what’s filming in the area, and it has some real-world value (i.e., “This is something I could get paid to do”).
• Richest billionaires in [state/province] is still a major draw despite a perception gap
  • This monthly series rises to the top among local stories every month
  • Local editors often assume stories like this won’t land with lower-income or highly localized markets, but curiosity continues to grab readers.
• Historical weather extremes, such as Biggest snowfalls in [state] history continue to hit
  • Unsurprisingly, our ‘Coldest month’ stories have outperformed the ‘Hottest month’ by about 3x during the winter months.
    

💡 We expect the performance of this monthly series to reverse as it continues to heat up, especially seeing as March has already seen historic high temperatures across many states.

For newsrooms that specialize in local reporting, these series with broad appeal can supplement the daily lineup, allowing them to focus on highly local on-the-ground reporting.

Reliable winners: timely pocketbook issues

• Real estate draws consistent pageviews, especially tied to affordability and timing, like Is it cheaper to buy or rent in [metro] in 2026?
• Though metro-level real estate roughly doubles the amount of average pageviews compared to state-level, even the latter versions are reliably strong
• As such, we regularly run real estate content in different formats, from standalone stories, (like What salary do I need to afford a house in [metro] in 2026?) to series on both a weekly and monthly cadence
• Gas prices are a clear example of how immediate, service-driven stories benefit from deeper localization.
• In some cases, weekly metro-level updates have driven up to 10x the pageviews of their state-level counterparts

Overall, series do more heavy lifting than standalone stories. You don’t need every repeatable story to surge in performance if it’s helping form the habit of bringing readers back weekly to see what will affect them here and now.

What isn’t performing now

Some formats seem like they should capture interest, but are proving either too light or too dense to hit close to home.

• • Certain lifestyle stories draw lower readership if they lack urgency or clear local relevance
    • Music - Top 25 songs in [metro] on Shazam this week
      • Though entertainment angles are often dependable as they’re widely appealing, this one doesn’t seem to carry enough novelty or immediacy on a weekly basis
    • Style - Most popular diamond shapes by [state]
      • Not all flashy things catch eyes. This is simply too narrow and not meaningfully tied to local interest (as say, a regional trend or food piece might be)
• Infrastructure-focused stories
  • More electric vehicles means less gas tax revenue: How this impacts [state]'s budget
  • While timely, it doesn’t connect to a reader’s day-to-day decisions or costs, limiting its pull compared to direct pocketbook-driven stories.

What local content is expected to perform this spring

Looking at last year’s Q2 local performance and our H1 tentpole events calendar, there’s an overarching theme that spring is filled with life shifts like graduation, summer planning, and moving. These moments tend to push audiences toward more practical, decision-driven content.

So while there is still room for broader-interest angles with less urgency, the highest-performing local Q2 stories from 2025 had pocketbook relevance, tied to seasonal trends like summer travel.

Think: How much it costs to park at [airport]. And what fully popped off in June: Car insurance rates in [metro]. Summer driving tends to increase and moving season ramps up, both of which make locally specific costs more urgent.

Education is part of the decision-making mix, with stories like Best public schools in [metro] breaking through (outperforming Private schools more than 2x). Ultimately, the local Q2 formats we expect to reliably perform will be tied to comparing options and weighing decisions ahead of summer and even fall.

Why this matters

Americans trust local news more than national news, but overall confidence is declining, and attention is harder to win.

Local outlets are tasked with keeping their loyal audience while pulling new readers in from the crowd. There’s a consistent appetite for hyperspecific practical content, and broader interest stories to bring new readers in the door.

We’re constantly talking to local newsrooms and analyzing traffic to determine which topics and formats translate to real readership. We’re happy to do so for your newsroom– whether you already use Stacker newswire or you’re interested in doing so. Together, we can create a more sustainable future for local journalism.