Fact-checking organizations operate at substantial global scale, but the field remains financially concentrated and unevenly distributed. The Duke Reporters’ Lab counted 443 active projects worldwide in 2025, while a 2025 survey found that grants supplied 46.2% of average revenue among 137 organizations. Local coverage is especially uneven in the United States: a 2022 study found no dedicated local fact-checking project in 29 states.
Contents
- Global scale and geographic reach
- Growth, turnover and longevity
- Organizational profile and financial pressure
- Platforms, audiences and formats
- Editorial focus and collaboration
- Local fact-checking infrastructure in the United States
Global scale and geographic reach
The Duke Reporters’ Lab counted 443 active fact-checking projects worldwide in 2025. Its archive also recorded 451 active projects at the end of 2024. The later census report gave a current count covering projects in 116 countries and 70 languages. These figures describe projects, rather than necessarily distinct legal entities, so they show the breadth of activity across the field.
The geographic pattern is not uniform. Europe’s count rose from 131 projects at the end of 2022 to 139 at the end of 2024. Africa remained within a narrow range of 66 to 67 projects from 2022 through 2024, while South America stayed within a range of 38 to 39. The 2025 census also identified nearly 80 active projects operating in countries classified as particularly dangerous for journalism.
The United States had 61 active fact-checking projects at the end of 2025, compared with 65 at the end of 2024. Australia had four active projects in the 2025 count. Together, these figures illustrate how national totals can sit within a much larger international network while changing from one census period to the next.
Sources: Fact-Checking Census Archives and 2026 census: Fact-checking losses continue amid funding pressure, but most projects persist.
Growth, turnover and longevity
The worldwide count recorded a net loss of 23 projects in 2025. That result contrasts with a net change of zero in 2024, when 13 projects started and 13 ended. In 2023, 17 projects opened and 19 closed, producing a net decrease of two. Earlier growth was stronger: the Reporters’ Lab counted 79 new fact-checking projects during 2019.
Long-term survival is mixed. Of 122 projects that started in 2014 or earlier, 71 were still active in 2021. The 2023 census found roughly 50 organizations that had been active for at least 10 years, while the average lifespan of an active fact-checking site was under six years.
Inactive projects tended to be much shorter-lived. The 2021 census identified 38 inactive projects that had produced fact-checks for one year or less. The average lifespan of an inactive fact-checker was two years and three months, compared with more than 4.5 years for active fact-checkers in that census.
| Measure | Reported figure | Period |
|---|---|---|
| New projects | 79 | 2019 |
| Projects opened | 17 | 2023 |
| Projects closed | 19 | 2023 |
| Projects started | 13 | 2024 |
| Projects ended | 13 | 2024 |
| Net loss | 23 | 2025 |
The sequence points to a field with continuing entry and exit rather than a permanently settled institutional map. The longevity figures are historical measurements from the cited censuses; they should not be treated as independent verification of the status of every organization today.
Sources: Fact-Checking Census Archives, Fact-checking census shows slower growth, and 2026 census: Fact-checking losses continue amid funding pressure, but most projects persist.
Organizational profile and financial pressure
The 2025 State of the Fact-Checkers survey describes a field dominated by relatively small organizations. Nonprofits represented 60.3% of the 141 surveyed fact-checking organizations, while for-profit media outlets represented 34.8%. Organizations with 10 or fewer full-time employees made up 61.7% of surveyed fact-checkers.
Revenue was concentrated. Grants supplied an average 46.2% of revenue among 137 surveyed organizations in 2025. Meta’s third-party fact-checking program supplied an average 34.3%. A single source supplied at least half of revenue for 56.9% of surveyed organizations. By contrast, only 10.9% said that no single revenue source exceeded 24% of income.
Financial sustainability was the leading pressure in the survey. Funding and financial sustainability were cited as a top challenge by 89.1% of organizations. Staffing or expertise was a major challenge for 37.2%, and access to technology or tools was a challenge for 30.7%.
| Organizational measure | Share or average |
|---|---|
| Nonprofits | 60.3% |
| For-profit media outlets | 34.8% |
| Organizations with 10 or fewer full-time employees | 61.7% |
| Average revenue from grants | 46.2% |
| Average revenue from Meta’s program | 34.3% |
| Organizations citing funding sustainability as a top challenge | 89.1% |
The survey denominators differ: organizational-profile figures use 141 respondents, while several revenue and challenge figures use 137. Keeping those bases distinct matters when comparing the percentages.
Source: 2025 STATE OF THE FACT-CHECKERS REPORT.
Platforms, audiences and formats
Platform relationships were widespread in 2025. Meta’s third-party program included 56.2% of surveyed organizations. Among 85 organizations answering a follow-up question, 37.7% received more than half of their revenue from Meta. Separately, 18.2% reported losing a technology-platform partnership or funding agreement during 2025. TikTok’s fact-checking program included 14.6% of surveyed organizations.
Audience results were more positive than the funding picture. Audience size increased in 2025 for 62.0% of surveyed fact-checking organizations and decreased for 13.9%. Format choices reflected a push toward short, portable distribution: 72.3% named short-form video an effective format, and 54.7% said it was the format they most expanded or tried for the first time. WhatsApp channels were newly tried or significantly expanded by 27.7%.
Access remained a central distribution choice. A total of 96.4% of surveyed organizations made all fact-checking content available without a paywall in 2025. That percentage describes availability, not audience size or the financial sustainability of the organizations producing the content.
Source: 2025 STATE OF THE FACT-CHECKERS REPORT.
Editorial focus and collaboration
The 2023 State of Fact-Checkers survey found that elections and political claims were covered by 95.62% of 137 surveyed organizations. Economic issues were covered by 93.43%, public health by 84.67%, climate science by 75.18%, and immigration or migration by 71.53%.
The survey also measured how organizations handled misinformation categories. Both internet misinformation and political misinformation were handled in roughly equal parts by 57.66% of surveyed organizations. These percentages describe whether surveyed organizations covered a topic; they do not measure the number of checks published or the relative audience for each topic.
Collaboration was common in the 2025 survey. Other fact-checkers were the most common collaborators, cited by 81% of organizations. NGOs or civil-society organizations were partners for 70.8%. Academic or research institutions were partners for 65.0%, and media outlets were partners for 65.7%.
Taken together, the figures show an editorial field concentrated on political and public-interest claims, with collaboration extending beyond journalism organizations. The 2023 topic figures and 2025 collaboration figures come from different survey periods and should be read as separate snapshots.
Sources: 2023 • STATE OF FACT-CHECKERS and 2025 STATE OF THE FACT-CHECKERS REPORT.
Local fact-checking infrastructure in the United States
The Reporters’ Lab’s 2022 midterm-election study found a pronounced state-level gap. Twenty-nine U.S. states had no dedicated local fact-checking project, while active projects existed in 21 states. Of those 21 states, 14 had at least two projects each. Seven states plus the District of Columbia had only one locally focused fact-checking project.
The study counted 46 local fact-checking projects across the United States. Texas had five local fact-checking outlets, the highest state count. Iowa and North Carolina each had four. Florida, Michigan and Wisconsin each had three. More than 50% of outlets producing state- and local-level fact-checks were local television stations.
Almost one-quarter of the 46 local projects were affiliated with PolitiFact. The affiliation figure concerns the projects identified in that study, while the state counts describe where locally focused activity was found during the 2022 midterm-election period.
| Local U.S. measure | Reported figure | Study period |
|---|---|---|
| States without a dedicated local project | 29 | 2022 midterm-election study |
| States with active local projects | 21 | 2022 midterm-election study |
| States with at least two projects | 14 | 2022 midterm-election study |
| Local projects nationwide | 46 | 2022 midterm-election study |
| Highest state count, Texas | 5 | 2022 midterm-election study |
Source: Fact Deserts.