January 3, 2022

NewsMatch funders pledged $6 million to 2021 campaign and an additional $6 million for future years 

As of December 31, 2021, the Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) and its partners raised $12 million to support the NewsMatch program, which benefits nonprofit news organizations across North America. The $12 million total includes $6 million in matching funds, incentive bonuses and organizational support for the 2021 campaign, eclipsing the $5.1 million raised for the NewsMatch national fund in 2020. The other $6 million is seed funding to support the 2022 and 2023 campaigns – marking the first year that funders have formally committed dollar amounts to future funding cycles.

From November 1 through December, 300 nonprofit newsrooms participated in NewsMatch 2021, using the incentive of NewsMatch matching funds and bonuses to encourage individual donations from their audiences. INN will report the total raised by participating newsrooms in Spring 2022.

More noteworthy details about NewsMatch 2021 include:

• The 300 participating newsrooms marks a 15% increase from NewsMatch 2020, and includes 77 startups founded since 2019. It is more than four times the number of newsrooms that participated in the first NewsMatch in 2016.
  
• 24% of NewsMatch participants have a primary mission to serve communities of color

• 69% of participants have a local or statewide focus.
  
• NewsMatch 2021 funders include the Democracy Fund, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Meta Journalism Project, the Bernard and Anne Spitzer Charitable Trust, Google News Initiative, Inasmuch Foundation, the Independence Public Media Foundation, the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation, Kaphan Foundation, Loud Hound, Natasha and Dirk Ziff, the Present Progressive Fund at Schwab Charitable, Sarena Snider, Solidarity Giving, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Walton Family Foundation, and the Wyncote Foundation. Dozens of local and issue-based funders were also secured by newsrooms.
  

To participate in NewsMatch, newsrooms must be members of INN, which is open to nonpartisan, independent journalism organizations that meet certain standards. NewsMatch was started by Knight Foundation in 2016, was run for several years by the Democracy Fund, and became an INN program in 2020.