The findings represent a dramatic change of fortunes between London’s free sheets since September, when London Lite had an average daily readership of 745,000 for January to June this year, compared to 713,000 for thelondonpaper.

Ian Clark, general manager of thelondonpaper, tentatively welcomed the results but said he was still keen to see the sample sizes.

“The fact that thelondonpaper is up 20 per cent in terms of overall readership is very positive for us, and well above that of our competitors,” he said, noting: “We now have a greater percentage of ABC1s than the Standard.” 

London Lite will take comfort in the mere difference of 3,000 readers, despite the News International paper distributing some 100,000 more copies every day.

Steve Auckland, managing director of London Lite, said he was pleased with the figures: “Today’s new data shows that London Lite has 2.1 readers per copy compared to 1.7 readers per copy for thelondonpaper. The number of ABC1 readers for London Lite is 78 per cent compared to 73 per cent for thelondonpaper.

“These figures demonstrate that our consistent, responsible approach to distribution is continuing to produce strong results and a valuable audience for advertisers. We very much look forward to building the London Lite brand even further in the coming months.”  

However, the figures make grim reading for Associated stablemate the Standard, which dropped 23 per cent year-on-year after haemorrhaging more than 200,000 readers.

The publishing house will be comforted with news that its morning free sheet, Metro, has extended its lead as the biggest city-centric paper, up 30 per cent year-on-year to a readership of 2.5 million.