Milliyet

Milliyet has been part of Turkish newspaper reading for nearly a century, though its exact birth year is a matter of some dispute. The English Wikipedia entry dates the paper to 11 February 1926, when journalist Ali Naci Karacan founded it. Many other references, including the paper's own profile data, cite 1950 as the founding year, a date widely linked to a relaunch under Karacan's family. Either way, the title carries the weight of an old institution: its name means "nationality," and for decades it has been one of the country's major general-interest dailies.

Headquartered in Istanbul's Bağcılar district, Milliyet covers the full spread of a national newspaper: domestic politics, world news, business, culture, lifestyle, and sports. The print edition still exists, but the center of gravity has shifted online. Milliyet.com.tr runs a high-volume breaking-news operation, and its social channels push stories around the clock. The site brands itself as a "son dakika" destination, and its output on any given day mixes Turkish domestic coverage with wire-style international stories, from a global PHP vulnerability to Elon Musk's SpaceX share pledge.

Ownership has shaped the paper's modern identity. For years Milliyet sat inside the Doğan Group, one of Turkey's largest media conglomerates. In early 2011 it changed hands, moving to a partnership between the founding Karacan family and the Demirören group. It later became part of Demirören Medya, which owns a large share of Turkish print and broadcast media. That trajectory, from founder family to Doğan to Demirören, is the structural fact that explains much about how the paper operates today.

For readers, Milliyet remains a familiar stop for columnists and sports coverage. Its sports desk, branded Skorer, is a prominent name in Turkish football journalism, and the paper's long-running Milliyet Sports Award for World Athlete of the Year has international recognition. The newsroom has also served as a training ground for generations of Turkish journalists, a reputation that still shapes its brand. [edit]

Milliyet's stated purpose is straightforward: deliver national and international news to a mass Turkish audience, with a strong emphasis on breaking news. Its digital operation describes itself as covering "everything from politics to magazine, from sports to travel," and the paper's social media bios claim it is "Turkey's largest and Europe's third-largest news site," a promotional figure rather than an independently verified one. The editorial mix leans on columnists and opinion writing alongside hard news, and sports coverage through the Skorer brand remains a core part of the identity. [edit]

The founding story starts with Ali Naci Karacan, a journalist who launched Milliyet on 11 February 1926 according to Wikipedia's account. The 1950 date that appears in many references is best understood as a relaunch or refounding under Karacan's family, which is why both years circulate. For much of the twentieth century the paper built its reputation on serious national reporting and a roster of columnists, and by the 1990s its print circulation reportedly passed one million copies, a peak that made it one of Turkey's biggest-selling dailies.

Ownership changed the paper's course. Milliyet spent years inside the Doğan Group, the media arm of Doğan Holding. In early 2011 it moved to a partnership between the Karacan family and the Demirören group, and it later settled into Demirören Medya. That shift came amid a broader concentration of Turkish media ownership that press-freedom advocates have criticized. Through the 2010s and 2020s the paper pivoted to digital-first publishing, with milliyet.com.tr becoming the primary distribution channel and the print edition a secondary product. [edit]