Study: Direct Visitors to News Sites Three Times More Engaged Than Others

According to a new Pew Research Center study, readers who come to news sites directly are three times more engaged than those who come via Facebook links or search.

Of the 26 most popular news sites — including nytimes.com, cnn.com, news.yahoo.com and more — direct visitors spend about 4 minutes and 36 seconds per visit. Meanwhile, visitors via Facebook spend only 1 minute and 41 seconds per visit and visitors via search spend about the same (1:42 per visit).

Direct visitors also view many 24.8