PH Media Trust Plunges to All-Time Low of 28%

Public trust in the Philippine media has plunged to an all-time low of 28%, suffering a catastrophic 10-percentage-point drop over the past year.

According to the latest Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2026, this decline represents the sharpest loss of media confidence documented among all 48 global markets surveyed, dragging the country well below the international trust average of 37%.

Deepening Class Divides

The collapse in trust is heavily stratified by socioeconomic lines, revealing severe vulnerabilities among marginalized communities. Only 21% of individuals with low education levels and 23% of low-income earners say they trust most news. In stark contrast, trust remains significantly higher among university graduates (32%) and high-income earners (43%).

This growing skepticism coincides with an acute public anxiety over digital integrity. The report highlights that 66% of Filipinos remain highly concerned about their ability to distinguish real news from misinformation online.

The Exodus to Social Video

As credibility fades, audiences are rapidly abandoning traditional news formats. Television as a weekly news source has plummeted to 42%—down from 66% in 2020—while print media has withered to just 10%.

Instead, Filipinos are migrating to algorithmic and video-centric spaces. Social media and online video networks now dominate as a primary weekly news source for 70% of the population. This digital shift is led heavily by:

Facebook: 79%

YouTube: 45%

TikTok: 33%

Conversely, newer technologies fail to inspire confidence, with trust in news delivered via AI chatbots sitting at a meager 15%.

Fatigue and Political Warfare

Media analysts attribute the record-breaking erosion of trust to a toxic mix of systemic issues. Years of sustained political hostility, targeted red-tagging, and legal harassment against journalists have successfully chipped away at the press's institutional authority.

Furthermore, the country's highly polarized digital space—often weaponized by coordinated influence operations—has fostered widespread public cynicism. This environment has left many citizens viewing major news networks as political or corporate mouthpieces rather than objective truth-tellers, driving 51% of Filipinos to actively avoid the news altogether.