Changes to the Facebook Algorithm Decreased News Visibility Between 2021-2024

TL;DR

This study analyzes Facebook's algorithmic changes from 2016 to 2025, revealing significant suppression of news content, especially low-quality sources, and showing that recent policy shifts increased news visibility and reactions.

Contribution

It provides comprehensive empirical evidence of Facebook's news suppression tactics and their impact on news visibility over nearly a decade.

Findings

Reactions to news declined by 78% from 2021 to 2024.

Suppression targeted low-quality news sources.

End of 'War on News' in 2025 increased reactions to news.

Abstract

Platforms, especially Facebook, are primary news sources in the US. In its widely criticized "War on News," Meta algorithmically deprioritized news and political content. We use data from 40 news organizations (5,243,302 Facebook posts, 7,875,372,958 user reactions) and 21 non-news pages (396,468 posts; 1,909,088,308 reactions) between January 1, 2016 and February 13, 2025 to examine how these changes influenced news visibility on the platform. Reactions to news declined by 78% between 2021 and 2024 while reactions to non-news pages increased, indicating targeted suppression of news visibility. Low-quality sources were especially suppressed, yet the 2025 end to "War on News" increased user reactions to news, especially low-quality ones. These changes do not reflect decreased news supply, Facebook user base, or interest in news over this period.