How long a story lasts.
124 breaking stories, 11,249 headlines from 190 newsrooms, 11 October to 3 November 2026.Measured 10 November 2026.The first week, hour by hour
Share of a story's first-week headlines published in each hour after it broke. The average of 124 stories. For 70 of them, the busiest hour was the first or the second.
11 hoursuntil half of a story's first-week headlines are out. For half of the stories it took between 4 and 27 hours.
65%of the first week's headlines appear within 24 hours, and 84% within 48.
15 hoursuntil newsrooms publish a tenth as many headlines as in the busiest six hours.
Day by day
- 65%Day 1
- 15%Day 2
- 7%Day 3
- 4%Day 4
- 3%Day 5
- 3%Day 6
- 4%Day 7
Three stories
- Robert E. Hall and Michael Woodford win 2026 Nobel Prize in Economics44 headlines, 40 newsrooms. Most of the coverage came within the first six hours.
- Death toll rises to 68 after two high-speed trains collide in Spain357 headlines, 102 newsrooms. A second rise on day 7, when the transport minister resigned.
- Melania Trump secures ceasefire in Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Oleshky169 headlines, 75 newsrooms. A second rise on day 4, when the ceasefire took effect.
How we measured
The stories are the ones TOLD lists under Suddenly: events that many newsrooms reported within a few hours. The clock starts when 4 newsrooms have reported a story within 6 hours.
For the next seven days we read every headline from the newsrooms TOLD follows and picked out the ones that could be about the same event, by meaning and by shared words. Claude Haiku then judged each one from the headline alone: about this event, or about something else? A second check separated the event from the larger story it belongs to, such as a war or an election.
Every counted headline is kept with its link. The count covers headlines, not article text, and only stories that broke quickly. The second check leans strict, so the half-way point lies between 11 and 17 hours.