Digiday digest: The Atlantic’s redesign win, Under Armour’s dominance and Cosmo on Snapchat

It’s Friday, so we’ve recapped the best of Digiday reporting from the week just as you head into happy hour.

Turns out it’s true: less is more. The Atlantic’s new redesign gave people less content to click on, but they stayed with it longer: The click through rate tripled and people now spend four minutes or more on native ads.

Meanwhile, across the pond, The New York Times is opening a native ad division in London. So far there are four permanent staffers on the ground compared to the 45 member team back in New York. The studio is going after European and Asian markets.

Watch out, Adidas and Nike: Under Armour is growing at a faster pace than both and will become the third biggest sportswear brand in the world in the next decade. How? By focusing on women, appealing to a younger demo, and winning on social.

Speaking of winning on social, Cosmo is killing it on Snapchat, averaging 3 million viewers a day, up from 1.8 million since the summer. Advertisers want in on this too, but for now you can only share editorial videos.

More in Media

The Rundown: Google has drawn its AI payment lines — and publishers’ leverage is narrow

For publishers trying to navigate AI licensing, the message was blunt: Google is willing to pay for access, but not for training – and it remains unwilling to define AI Overviews as a compensable use of journalism.

search referral traffic for publishers

Media Briefing: Google’s latest core update a reminder that pageviews can’t remain the primary metric

Google’s latest core update signals pageviews can no longer be the primary metric, favoring intent-solving publishers over scale.

After an oversaturation of AI-generated content, creators’ authenticity and ‘messiness’ are in high demand

Content creators and brand marketing specialists on how 2026 will be the year creator authenticity becomes even more crucial in the face of rampant AI-generated “slop” flooding social media platforms.