The 50,000-Insert Minimum in 10 Cities: What Share of Each City's Dailies It Reaches (2026)

A 50,000-insert run, the smallest newspaper insertion order on our card, equals 20 to 33.3 percent of the daily copies our Jaipur page counts and only 5 to 6.25 percent of the copies our Delhi page counts. Every one of our ten newspaper insertion city pages carries the same minimum and the same per-insert card: A5 at Rs.1.25, A4 at Rs.1.70 and the A2 newsprint poster at Rs.2.20, so the minimum costs Rs.62,500, Rs.85,000 or Rs.1,10,000 before 18 percent GST in every city. What changes is the denominator. Each page publishes its own daily reach figure, and set against those figures the same order is close to a citywide drop in four cities and a single pocket in three. The shares below are our arithmetic on figures read from the ten live pages on 3 October 2026.

What share of each city's daily newspapers does a 50,000-insert order reach?

The method is plain: 50,000 divided by the top and bottom of each page's published range. It is not a readership survey of ours, just the minimum measured against the reach each page already publishes.

Read the width of each range as well as its midpoint. Bangalore's 3 to 5 lakh is the widest relative spread on the list, so its share runs from 10 to 16.7 percent depending on which end is true; Delhi's 8 to 10 lakh is the tightest, so its 5 to 6.25 percent is the most precise figure here. Where a range is wide, the page is telling you its reach estimate is loose, and a quote should name the papers and zones behind the number rather than the city total. The partner paper counts point the same way: Delhi and Mumbai each list 9 plus papers across two or three languages, so a 50,000 run has to choose a paper as well as a zone, while Jaipur, Ahmedabad and Lucknow list 6 plus. Language is the first cut in every city: Tamil and English in Chennai, Telugu, English and Urdu in Hyderabad, Bengali, English and Hindi in Kolkata.

Where is the 50,000 minimum close to a citywide drop?

Jaipur is the outlier. Its page counts 1.5 to 2.5 lakh daily copies across 22 plus zones and 6 plus papers in Hindi and English, so one minimum run is a fifth to a third of everything the page says it can reach. A first Jaipur run is not a sample; on the page's own figure it covers a large slice of the city in one morning, so pick the language and zones first.

Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Pune share the next band, 16.7 to 25 percent, because all three publish 2 to 3 lakh daily copies. Pune splits into Marathi readers of Sakal and Maharashtra Times and English readers in the IT corridor, which our Pune guide works zone by zone. Lucknow's page says its Hindi dailies collectively reach the same 2 to 3 lakh households, so the language decision is mostly made for you.

Where is the minimum only one pocket of the city?

Delhi is the opposite end. Its page counts 8 to 10 lakh daily copies across Delhi-NCR, with 25 plus zones and 9 plus papers, so 50,000 inserts are 5 to 6.25 percent of that reach. On our arithmetic, covering every copy the page counts would take 16 to 20 minimum orders. A first Delhi run is one area, say Dwarka or Rohini, not a Delhi launch.

Mumbai, at 5 to 7 lakh daily copies and 27 plus zones, gives 7.1 to 10 percent. Kolkata, at 4 to 6 lakh, gives 8.3 to 12.5 percent. Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad sit between 10 and 16.7 percent. In all six, one minimum run covers a cluster of neighbouring zones in one language and should be planned as a test, read before the next run is booked.

What does the 50,000 minimum cost in each city?

Because the card is national, the minimum costs the same in Jaipur as in Delhi. The difference is what the money buys relative to the city: in Jaipur, Rs.73,750 with GST for A5 inserts is up to a third of the page's daily copies, while in Delhi the same Rs.73,750 is about one sixteenth to one twentieth.

One line on the pages needs a written answer before you book. The card text on each page prices A5 at Rs.1.25 and Rs.1.15 above 50,000, and our Hyderabad page states a full A5 drop of 50,000 at Rs.62,500 plus GST. But the pricing table on all ten pages has three columns, a base price, 50,000 to 99,999 and 1,00,000 plus, and the 50,000 to 99,999 column shows Rs.1.15 for A5, Rs.1.50 for A4 and Rs.2.00 for A2. Read that way, exactly 50,000 A5 inserts would be Rs.57,500, not Rs.62,500, and the base column would apply to no bookable quantity. We quote the minimum at the base rate, as the card text and the Hyderabad page do; if your quote shows Rs.1.15 at exactly 50,000, that reading of the table is the reason. Orders of 1 lakh and above are Rs.1.15 for A5 on either reading.

What would it cost to reach every copy a city page counts?

Few campaigns should go near this ceiling. Its use is the gap between rows: reaching every copy Jaipur's page counts costs about a quarter of what Delhi's would, on our arithmetic, and Rs.3,45,000 of A5 inserts covers the published reach of Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Lucknow or Pune once, but only about 43 to 60 percent of Mumbai's and 30 to 38 percent of Delhi's. In Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad the same Rs.3,45,000 buys 60 percent to all of the published copies, depending on where the true figure sits in the range.

Which city pages publish figures that do not reconcile?

Five of the ten pages carry a second number that cannot sit beside their own daily reach, and a buyer should know which one the quote is built on.

Delhi: the page counts 8 to 10 lakh daily copies, but its quick facts and two paragraphs say 1.6 crore plus daily copies circulate across Delhi-NCR, 16 to 20 times as many. Its FAQ adds a third reading, 8 to 10 lakh households per major daily rather than across all of them. Against 1.6 crore, 50,000 inserts would be about 0.31 percent. Plan on the 8 to 10 lakh figure, which is the one the inserts are said to reach.

Jaipur: the page gives Rajasthan Patrika a daily circulation of 8 lakh plus and Dainik Bhaskar 6 lakh plus, yet counts 1.5 to 2.5 lakh daily copies for the city. Patrika alone is three to five times the city figure, which suggests the circulation numbers are wider than Jaipur city; the page does not say. Against Patrika's 8 lakh, 50,000 would be 6.25 percent, not 20 to 33.3.

Kolkata: the page says Anandabazar Patrika alone reaches over 6 lakh households daily, which is the top of its 4 to 6 lakh range for every paper together. Elsewhere it says an insert reaches 1.5 crore plus residents, which is the city's population, not the reach of a run.

Chennai and Ahmedabad: both cite readership rather than copies. Chennai's Daily Thanthi is described as reaching over 18 lakh readers daily and Ahmedabad's Gujarat Samachar and Divya Bhaskar together over 25 lakh, against city copy counts of 3 to 4 lakh and 2 to 3 lakh. Readers are not copies, so these do not belong in an insert plan.

Bangalore, Hyderabad, Lucknow, Mumbai and Pune use one reach range throughout. Mumbai also mentions 75 lakh daily rail commuters and Andheri's 4 lakh plus households, but neither is presented as a copy count.

Is the published figure per newspaper or for the whole city?

The pages are not consistent. The quick facts read as a city total, for example 2 to 3 lakh daily copies across 7 plus papers in Pune, but the same pages call the range households receiving a major daily, and Delhi's FAQ says per major daily outright. If the range is per title, the citywide reach is larger and every share in the first table is an upper bound, so the minimum is an even smaller slice of the city than shown. Either way the ranking holds: the minimum is a far bigger piece of Jaipur than of Delhi. When you brief a run, ask which papers the quoted reach covers and in which zones.

Which city gives a first insert test the cleanest read?

Our view: where the minimum is a large share, the risk is spending a fifth of the city's reach on an untested message, so split it. In Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Lucknow or Pune, consider splitting the one 50,000 order into two zones of 25,000 each, and ask whether a second version with its own coupon code can print within the same order, so the first run tells you something beyond whether it worked. Where the minimum is a small share, as in Delhi, Mumbai or Kolkata, keep the whole 50,000 in one compact area and one language, because thinning it across a city of 8 to 10 lakh copies leaves nothing measurable anywhere. Put a coupon code or QR per zone on the insert in both cases, since the distribution report proves delivery, not response.

Before booking, settle five things in writing: the per-insert rate at your exact quantity, given the table column above; which papers and editions carry the run; the zones or pin codes, with how many inserts each; the date and whether it falls in a busy season when vendor bundles fill up; and the response mechanism on the insert itself.