About Macau Daily News

Macau Daily News

Macau Daily News — also rendered Macao Daily News, in Chinese Aomen Ribao and in Portuguese Diário de Macau — is a Chinese-language daily newspaper published in Macau. Media-of-Macau references describe it as Macau's top circulation daily, and it is the largest newspaper in Macau, accounting for 70 to 80 per cent of the city's newspaper circulation. It was established on 15 August 1958, co-founded by Lei Seng Chon, and is a daily published in Macau with the backing of the Chinese Communist Party. It is one of two popular Chinese-language dailies in the city, in a territory noted for having the highest media density in the world, with nine Chinese-language dailies among its newspapers. To understand Macau's press, this is the paper to start with: no other title in the city comes close to its share of readers, and its history, from a four-page letterpress sheet in 1958 to a full-colour paper produced in its own 23-storey building, is a compact history of Macau publishing itself.

Established on 15 August 1958 by Lei Seng Chon

Macao Daily News was founded by Lei Seng Chong — also rendered Lei Seng Chon — on 15 August 1958. A Macao philatelic issue marking the 60th anniversary of the publication in 2018 recorded that the paper was founded by Mr Lei Seng Chong on that date, and government information about the University of Macau's honorary doctorates recorded that Lei co-founded the Macao Daily News with his friends in 1958 and successively served as manager, vice-editor-in-chief, editor-in-chief and director of the newspaper, later becoming president of the board of directors of the Macao Daily News and the Macao Culture and Media Group. Lei was also a deputy to the National People's Congress, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, a member of the drafting committee for the Basic Law of the Macao SAR and of the preparatory committee of the Macao SAR — a biography that shows how central the paper's founder was to Macau's public life as the city moved towards its 1999 return to Chinese sovereignty. The paper's own stated aims, recorded in the anniversary account, were to promote patriotism and Chinese culture, and to report the news of the city, the country and the world in the medium favoured by Macao people.

From a Four-Page Letterpress Sheet to Full-Colour Production

At the beginning, the newspaper used a black and red ink letterpress printing machine to print a large sheet with four pages. Sixty years later, an issue of the newspaper ran to a few dozen columns across some ten pages in full-colour printing. Macao Daily News was the pioneer in using the high-speed rotary offset printing machine in Macao. The construction of its 23-storey building made it one of the few print media companies in Hong Kong and Macao to have administration, printing and storage in the same building. That production history matters because it mirrors the paper's market history. A title that began with the most basic printing technology available in the Macau of 1958 invested, over six decades, in each step of modern newspaper production — rotary offset first in the city, then full colour, then a purpose-built headquarters tower combining editorial offices, presses and warehousing. Newspapers that dominate a small market for sixty years do so partly by out-investing rivals in exactly this unglamorous infrastructure.

The Largest Newspaper in Macau: 70 to 80 Per Cent of Circulation

The paper is now the largest newspaper in Macau, accounting for 70 to 80 per cent of the city's newspaper circulation, a figure sourced to the BBC's Macau media guide. Media-of-Macau listings describe it in a single line as the top circulation daily, Chinese-language. A Macao anniversary account put the point in comparative terms, saying that, regarded as a mainstream news medium, the newspaper's circulation stands on top among different Hong Kong and Macao major newspapers serving the city. GGRAsia, the gaming-industry news service, routinely identifies it for its readers as the city's largest-circulation Chinese-language newspaper, as it did when reporting court news sourced to the paper. In practical terms, a 70 to 80 per cent share means Macao Daily News is not merely first among equals: for most newspaper readers in Macau, on most days, it is the newspaper — the default record of local government, courts, business and community life, against which every other Macau title's circulation is a minority share.

Content: Local, Mainland, Taiwan, International, Economy and Sport

A University of Macau study of Macao newspapers' websites recorded that Macao Daily News was founded in 1958 and that its website carried more articles about news, columns and editorials than its local peers, with sections including local news, news focus, international news, mainland news, Taiwan news, sport, economy and columns. The paper began to be published on the internet on Saturdays starting from November 2002, in the phased online development that study described. The anniversary account of its editorial character says the newspaper reports political and social news boldly and unbiasedly, stands firm on justice, and criticises vices and exalts virtues. Its coverage of mainland affairs is an institutional as well as editorial relationship: on 26 November 2024, Nanfang Media Group inaugurated its Macao News Bureau at the Macao Daily News, described in that report as the largest newspaper in Macao, in a ceremony attended by Lok Po, director and chief editor of Macao Daily News, alongside the director of the Macao Government Information Bureau and Nanfang's editor-in-chief. Lok Po said the unveiling marked a new stage in cooperation between Macao Daily News and the Nanfang Media Group.

Macau's Media Density: Nine Chinese-Language Dailies

No profile of this paper is complete without the market it dominates, because Macau's media density is itself a famous fact. Macau reportedly has the highest media density in the world: nine Chinese-language dailies, three Portuguese-language dailies and three English-language dailies, together with half a dozen Chinese-language weeklies and a Portuguese-language weekly. The Macao Government Information Bureau's own current listing counts 13 Chinese daily newspapers publishing regularly, naming Macao Daily News first among them, alongside three Portuguese dailies and the English dailies Macau Post Daily and Macau Daily Times, with 109 periodicals holding valid registration as of 2025. All local newspapers published for at least five years are entitled to subsidies from the government. Macau's media market is nevertheless rather small, and local media face strong competition from Hong Kong: about three dozen newspapers from Hong Kong, mainland China, Taiwan and the Philippines are shipped to Macau every early morning. That Macao Daily News holds 70 to 80 per cent of local circulation against both a dozen local rivals and daily imports from Hong Kong is the measure of its position.

A Newspaper History Older Than the Paper: Macau's Press Since 1822

Macau's newspaper tradition long predates 1958, and Macao Daily News is its modern inheritor. The first newspaper published in Macau was A Abelha da China, published for one year from 1822 to 1823. A Macao yearbook history records that in 1893 Dr Sun Yat Sen and a Macanese collaborator founded Echo Macanese, published in Chinese and Portuguese, and that after the 1911 Revolution Macau's Chinese newspapers began to flourish, with titles including Macao Times, Oyster Mirror Evening Post, Macao Bulletin and Oyster Mirror Daily. Among the Chinese papers with longer history in Macao, a University of Macau study named Jornal Va Kio, founded in 1937, Jornal do Cidadão, founded in 1944, and Macao Daily News, founded in 1958, as the three leading historical titles with websites. Macao's Chinese dailies as a group have been recorded as printing a total of about 100,000 copies a day. Placed in that two-century sequence, Macao Daily News is a relatively late arrival that became, within its first two decades, the tradition's dominant modern representative.

Community Role: The Charity Fund From the Readers

Rooted in Macao, Macao Daily News set up the Charity Fund From the Readers of Macao Daily News, pledging to give back and serve the community. The anniversary account of the paper presents the fund as part of its identity: six decades after its establishment, the newspaper continues to strive for excellence while serving the city that sustains it. Community fundraising of this kind is a recognised role for a dominant local daily in a small city, where the newspaper is one of the few institutions that can mobilise readers across the whole population quickly. It fits the paper's self-description as a mainstream medium rooted in Macao rather than an edition of an outside title. For many Macau readers, the paper's presence in civic life — through the readers' charity fund, through anniversary observances attended by senior government officials, and through its role as host institution for mainland media cooperation — is as familiar as its news pages.

Political Backing and Position in the Macao SAR

Reference works describe Macao Daily News as a daily published in Macau with the backing of the Chinese Communist Party, and its founding aims — promoting patriotism and Chinese culture — are stated openly in its own anniversary record. Its founder's roles in drafting the Macao Basic Law and preparing the Special Administrative Region place the paper's leadership inside the institutions of the handover settlement itself. Like all press in Macau, the paper operates under the Basic Law and the Press Law, which uphold freedom of the press in the territory, and newspapers are registered by the Government Information Bureau under Article 15 of the Press Law. Academic analysis of the Macao press describes a media system that transitioned from Portuguese to Chinese sovereignty in 1999 and became one of the cities with the largest number of published newspapers per capita, within which the largest-circulation paper is the Chinese-language Macao Daily News. Readers should therefore understand the paper as both a commercial market leader and an establishment institution of the Macao SAR.

Anniversaries, Recognition and the Paper Today

The paper's longevity is publicly marked in Macau in a way few newspapers anywhere experience. Macao Post Daily reported the reception celebrating the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the Chinese-language Macao Daily News, noting that the biggest local newspaper was founded on 15 August 1958, and the Macao postal service issued a commemorative philatelic item for the 60th anniversary of its publication, authored by Lok Po — the same Lok Po recorded in 2024 as the paper's director and chief editor. The Government Information Bureau's current media listing continues to place Macao Daily News at the head of Macau's 13 regularly publishing Chinese dailies. Its official website, in Chinese, carries its local, mainland, Taiwan, international, economy and sports coverage to readers beyond the print edition. Sixty-five years and more after a four-page letterpress first issue, the paper remains what the BBC's media guide and every local listing agree it is: Macau's top-circulation daily newspaper.

Why Macau Daily News Matters

Macau Daily News matters for the completeness of its dominance and for what that dominance reveals about small media markets. In a city with the world's highest media density — nine or more Chinese-language dailies, Portuguese and English dailies, dozens of registered periodicals, and Hong Kong papers flown in every morning — one title takes 70 to 80 per cent of newspaper circulation. It achieved that position from a 1958 letterpress start, through pioneering rotary offset printing in Macau, full-colour production, and a 23-storey headquarters combining administration, printing and storage. It matters, too, as a civic institution, through the Charity Fund From the Readers and the public roles of its founder in Macau's constitutional transition, and as a bridge to the mainland, hosting Nanfang Media Group's Macao News Bureau from November 2024. Any directory of world newspapers that omitted Macau's largest title would be missing the single most-read newspaper in the Macao Special Administrative Region.