AOP Announces Winners of the Digital Publishing Awards 2026
Published: 12 Jun 2026
London, UK, 12th June 2026 – The Association of Online Publishers (AOP) celebrated its 24th Awards yesterday, honouring the digital publishing industry’s top talent at the in-person ceremony, held at Old Billingsgate in London.
AOP’s flagship event was hosted by comedian Aurie Styla and recognised the individuals, teams and companies driving the growth and innovation of the digital publishing sector. With categories judged by a panel of digital industry experts, under the guidance of co-chairs Jacqui Merrington, Executive Editor at The Independent and Chris Cannon, Managing Director at TechFinitive, there were 26 category winners across Individual, Team, Publishing and Grand Prix categories, and 16 highly commended entries.
Notably, William Reed won Best Digital Publishing Company, in acknowledgement of the business’ outstanding work reviewing and evolving its operations, achieving both incredible business outcomes and impressive staff engagement, despite working within a highly challenging B2B landscape.
“The 2026 AOP Awards highlighted the resilience of our industry and our ability to harness the challenges we face to spark extraordinary innovation,” comments Richard Reeves, Managing Director at AOP. “The variety of winners and highly commended entries is something to be proud of, and I’m thrilled we continue to be able to celebrate the people, teams and businesses powering our industry.”
Among the other winners on the night was Katie Jones of Farmers Guardian, who took home the prestigious Editor of the Year accolade, Gordon Rayner of The Telegraph, who won Journalist of the Year, and William Reed’s Bethany Walker, who won the Rising Star award. Immediate also celebrated multiple wins in the AOP Employer Excellence, AOP Publishing Innovation Award: Audiences and Best Research / Insight Project categories.
The full list of winners is as follows:
Editor of the Year
Journalist of the Year
Rising Star
Sales Person of the Year
The AOP Award for Inspiring Local Journalism, sponsored by Google News Initiative
Advertising Operations Team of the Year, Sponsored by Index Exchange
Audience Development Team of the Year, sponsored by UKOM
Commercial Team of The Year, sponsored by Utiq
Editorial Team of the Year: B2B
Editorial Team of the Year: Consumer
Product Development Team of the Year, sponsored by Mantis
Best Creative Solutions Led / Content Marketing Campaign
Best Media Technology Partner: Audiences
Best Media Technology Partner: Revenues
Best Publisher-led Social Good Initiative or Campaign
Best Research / Insight Project
Best Use of Audio
Best Video Strategy
The AOP Employer Excellence Award, sponsored by Lewis Silkin
The AOP Publishing Business Effectiveness Award
The AOP Publishing Innovation Award: Audiences
The AOP Publishing Innovation Award: Revenues, sponsored by Google
Best Online Brand: B2B
Best Online Brand: Consumer
Small Digital Publisher of the Year, sponsored by Deloitte
Best Digital Publishing Company 2026
Additional details on the AOP Digital Publishing Awards 2026 can be found here.
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About the Association of Online Publishers
The Association of Online Publishers (AOP) is an industry body representing digital publishing companies that create original, branded, quality content. AOP champions the interests of media owners from diverse backgrounds including newspaper and magazine publishing, TV and radio broadcasting, and pure online media. For more information, please visit www.ukaop.org.
