Spiegel.de
Spiegel Online (SPON for short) goes online on 25 October 1994 as the world's first news magazine; Spiegel Online appears on the web one day before Time (Time magazine). However, the Internet address www.spiegel.de is not used until a year later. The online news portal quickly developed into one of the leading news websites in the German-speaking world.
Erich Böhme, who had been Spiegel's editor-in-chief since 1989, was replaced in the same year by Stefan Aust, who remained editor-in-chief of Spiegel until 2008. From the very beginning, Spiegel Online had its own independent editorial team that specialised in digital content and thus operated in parallel to the print editorial team. This made it possible to develop specific online formats and reports.
"Tell it like it is", the motto of Spiegel founder Rudolf Augstein, describes the standard that not only Spiegel, but also Spiegel Online, sets for itself. This motto is the driving force behind the editorial team. The editorial team, which has won numerous journalism awards, provides news, analyses, interviews, commentaries, videos and photos around the clock - available on the web, smartphones, tablet computers and smart TVs. Spiegel Online also attaches great importance to interaction with its readers. They can comment on many articles, take part in surveys and exchange views in discussion forums. The presence on social media platforms also helps to reach and retain a broad readership.
The range of content on the news portal has been continuously expanded since 2013 and ranges from politics to sport, from business to health. In Berlin, 15 editors maintain contact with the federal government, political parties, companies and the capital's cultural scene. One reporter each reports from Munich and Düsseldorf. The international network of correspondents is the largest among German online media. The editorial team is represented in Washington, New York, London, Moscow, Beirut and Istanbul. Reporters regularly travel to major events and crisis areas around the world.
Spiegel and Spiegel ONLINE launch the Spiegel Plus digital service in 2016. From now on, individual articles from the news magazine and the news website on Spiegel ONLINE will be available for individual purchase. In 2017, Spiegel ONLINE launches a new audio format with the political podcast Stimmenfang. Further audio formats follow in the course of the year with Sascha Lobo - The Debate Podcast and Netzteil - The Tech Podcast. In 2018, der Spiegel and Spiegel ONLINE launch the new Spiegel+, a monthly subscription model for all digital paid content.
In 2020, SPON is renamed Der Spiegel after the editorial team was merged with that of the news magazine in 2019. After around 25 years, the news portal is given a modern look and new content in the same year. The launch of the new digital Spiegel will be accompanied by an umbrella brand campaign entitled "We hold up a mirror to the world".
The news magazine has stood for investigative journalism for over 75 years.
The approximately 500-strong editorial team, which today serves print and online, uncovers grievances with its reporting, sets the news, provides context in a complex world and sets the pace in public debate. It stands for investigative journalism. Its reach and journalistic standards make the DER SPIEGEL brand a highly trusted authority in the German media landscape.
At the end of 2018, the Relotius case shook the German media landscape. The journalist Claas Relotius, a renowned Spiegel reporter, was caught having invented or falsified extensive information in numerous of his articles. This major journalistic scandal led to the development of the Spiegel standards in 2021, which are seen as a reaction to the Relotius case, but also as a contemporary return to the principles according to which the Spiegel editorial team works. At a time when the truthfulness of the media is being called into question, this is important in order to defend quality journalism, according to Spiegel. The publishing house and editorial team also developed standards for editorial projects financed by foundations as well as standards for adverts, commercial partnerships and third-party funding.
Today, Der Spiegel has around 30 editorial offices in Germany and around the world. Around 60 fact-checkers in the documentation department also support the editorial offices of the Spiegel Group in their research and check finished articles. Their main task is verification and fact-checking. Spiegel-Dokumentation is also responsible for Digas, the Spiegel Group's press database with more than 100 million articles from German and international daily, weekly and monthly newspapers and magazines, specialised press and agencies. According to Spiegel, more than 10,000 articles are added every day.
Although separate in the early years, the print magazine DER SPIEGEL and spiegel.de (formerly SPIEGEL Online or SPON) are now united editorially and organisationally. The editor-in-chief of the print edition is also responsible for the medium's digital content. Content that appears in print in SPIEGEL can also be read online. The weekly reach of the print edition and its digital counterpart is over 12 million people. DER SPIEGEL is known for its investigative journalism and critical stance. The magazine has an extensive documentation department that ensures that all published information is thoroughly scrutinised.
Scandals such as the Relotius case (2018), but also other scandals and epoch-making events in the years when DER SPIEGEL did not yet have a digital presence, have not only shaped the history of the magazine itself, but have also triggered far-reaching discussions about press freedom, journalistic ethics and the role of the media in society. The quality medium lives up to its motto of "telling it like it is" time and again with publications of this kind.
Audience Share
0.01%
Ownership Type
private
Geographic Coverage
National
Content Type
Freemium
Media Companies / Groups
Spiegel Gruppe
Bertelsmann
Ownership Structure
DER SPIEGEL is published by DER SPIEGEL GmbH & Co. KG, which is wholly owned by SPIEGEL-Verlag Rudolf Augstein GmbH & Co. KG, which in turn belongs to Rudolf Augstein GmbH. The international media group Bertelsmann holds 25.5 per cent of the shares in the SPIEGEL Group via its wholly-owned subsidiary, RM Hamburg Holding GmbH. Bertelsmann is backed by the Mohn family. 24 per cent of the shares belong to the Augstein family, 50.5 per cent are held by the employees of the publishing house via a holding company (Mitarbeiter-KG). This is organised democratically and regularly elects new representatives.
The structure of voting rights within the Spiegel Group is unique in the European media landscape. The majority of voting rights are held by the Mitarbeiter-KG, which is made up of Spiegel employees. This means that the magazine's employees have a considerable influence on company decisions.
Voting Rights
The structure of voting rights within the Spiegel Group is unique in the European media landscape. The majority of voting rights are held by the Mitarbeiter-KG, which is made up of Spiegel employees. This means that the magazine's employees have a considerable influence on company decisions.
Individual Owner
General Information
Founding Year
1994
Affiliated Interests Founder
The Spiegel Group launched spiegel.de in 1994 with the aim of serving the growing interest in digital media. The foundation can therefore be seen as a strategic step to enter the digital market at an early stage and establish a strong online presence. The news portal is initially operated by a subsidiary of Spiegel-Verlag, which is why the news portal is legally and economically separate from the news magazine in the first few years.
Affiliated Interests Ceo
has been Chairman of the Management Board of Spiegel-Verlag since June 2020. He is also Managing Director of the companies DER SPIEGEL GmbH & Co. KG, SPIEGELnet GmbH, SPIEGEL Beteiligungsmanagement GmbH, Quality Channel GmbH, Ericus Beteiligungsmanagement GmbH, manager magazin Verlagsgesellschaft mbH and manager magazin new media GmbH & Co. KG. Hass trained as an office and haulage clerk. He has worked at Spiegel-Verlag since 1992, initially as Head of Sales Service in the Sales Marketing department from 1996. In 2001 he became Deputy Head of Sales Marketing, and in 2005 he took over as Head of Sales. In 2015, he became Managing Director of Spiegel-Verlag.
has been Managing Director of Spiegel-Verlag since June 2020. He is also Managing Director of the companies DER SPIEGEL GmbH & Co. KG, SPIEGEL Tech Lab GmbH, Ericus Beteiligungsmanagement GmbH and 11FREUNDE Verlag GmbH & Co. KG. Ottlitz began his journalistic career in 1995 as a local reporter for the Süddeutsche Zeitung. From 1997 to 2001, he attended the German School of Journalism in Munich. He then worked as a political editor at the Abendzeitung, from 2004 to 2006 as part of the CvD team at the Financial Times Deutschland and then as chief editor, head of copy and managing editor at Spiegel ONLINE. Ottlitz has been editor-in-chief of SZ.de since 2011 and a member of the editorial board of Süddeutsche Zeitung since 2014. In January 2018, he returned to Spiegel-Verlag as Head of Product Development.
Affiliated Interests Editor-In-Chief
born in 1962, studied economics and worked for the weekly newspaper Die Zeit from 1990 to 1999. He then worked at Der Spiegel as a reporter, author, head of the capital city office and deputy editor-in-chief until 2018, after which he returned to the capital city office. He has been Spiegel editor-in-chief since May 2023.
Affiliated Interests other important people
born 1978 in Bonn, is deputy editor-in-chief of Der Spiegel. She studied law in Trier, Aix-en-Provence and Berlin and received her doctorate from LMU Munich. From 2003 to 2004, she spent a year at the German School of Journalism in Munich. After working as an editor at the Financial Times Deutschland, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Sonntagszeitung, she moved to Spiegel in Berlin in 2013. In February 2019, she took over as head of the Spiegel capital city office. In May 2021, she became a member of the editorial board and has been deputy editor-in-chief since September 2023.
born 1974, is a member of the Spiegel editorial team. He studied history, philosophy and psychology in Hamburg and Bristol, then worked on a dissertation on contemporary history in Hamburg, Göttingen, London and Manchester. He only wanted to interrupt his doctorate for the Protestant School of Journalism in Berlin, but then finally decided in favour of journalism. From 2005, he worked for the news magazine Facts in Zurich, most recently as Co-Head of Culture & Society. Dörting joined Spiegel Online in 2007, where he was responsible for the culture section and later also the style section, as well as working as Head of Editorial Development and Strategic Projects. He has been Managing Editor since March 2017 and Editorial Director since January 2019. He has also been a member of the Spiegel editorial board since May 2021.
born 1976, is Head of Documentation. He studied sociology in Hanover and Berlin. During this time, Jansson was active for Wikipedia: first as an author and spokesperson, from 2004 to 2009 as Chairman and from 2014 to 2018 as Deputy Chairman of Wikimedia Deutschland. He has worked for Der Spiegel since 2008, initially as an editor at Spiegel Online and from 2010 as a documentary journalist, including in the field of data journalism. He has been part of the documentation team since 2017 and co-head since 2019. He has been a member of the Administrative Board of Verwertungsgesellschaft Wort (VG Wort) on behalf of Spiegel-Verlag since 2023 and has represented it as a shareholder of Presse-Monitor GmbH (PMG) since 2019.
Contact
DER SPIEGEL GmbH & Co. KG
Ericusspitze 1
20457 Hamburg, Deutschland
Tel. 040 3007-0
Fax. 040 3007-2247
E-Mail: spiegel@spiegel.de
Webseite: www.spiegel.de
Financial Information
Revenue (in Mill. $)
€ 267.0 Mio. (2022) / USD 281.2 Mio.
Operating Profit (in Mill. $)
€ 49.9 Mio. (2022) /USD 52.54 Mio.
Advertising (in % of total funding)
€ 31.0 Mio. (2021) / USD 32.6 Mio.
Market Share
Missing Data
Further Information
Meta Data
The print magazine DER SPIEGEL and spiegel.de (formerly SPIEGEL Online or SPON), which were separate in the early years, are now united editorially and organisationally. The editor-in-chief of the print edition is also responsible for the medium's digital content. Content that appears in print in SPIEGEL can also be read online. The weekly reach of the print edition and its digital counterpart is over 12 million people. DER SPIEGEL is known for its investigative journalism and critical stance. The magazine has an extensive documentation department that ensures that all published information is thoroughly scrutinised.
Scandals such as the Relotius case (2018), but also other scandals and epoch-making events in the years when DER SPIEGEL did not yet have a digital presence, have not only shaped the history of the magazine itself, but have also triggered far-reaching discussions about press freedom, journalistic ethics and the role of the media in society. The quality medium lives up to its motto of "telling it like it is" time and again with publications of this kind.
