By: Justin Winograd

For years, Apple News has presented itself as a neutral gateway to the world’s journalism, an elegant digital vestibule through which millions of Americans enter the daily torrent of information. Yet a new study has reignited long-simmering allegations that the app’s most prominent real estate—its handpicked “Top Stories” and “Trending” sections—tilts decisively in one political direction, raising questions not merely about newsroom judgment, but about the immense cultural power exercised by technology platforms over the modern public square. According to findings highlighted and contextualized in a report on Wednesday in The New York Post, Apple News’ editorial curation has systematically marginalized conservative outlets, effectively narrowing the spectrum of viewpoints presented to users at the very moment they are forming opinions about the nation’s most contentious debates.

The study in question was conducted by AllSides, a nonpartisan organization that classifies media outlets according to political leaning. Over a two-week period in October 2025, AllSides reviewed 166 articles that appeared on Apple News in sections that users cannot personalize—the very spaces that function as the app’s editorial front page. The results were striking. Not a single one of the 82 articles featured in the curated “Top Stories” section originated from outlets AllSides categorizes as right-leaning. Across the broader dataset, conservative sources accounted for a mere 2% of all stories reviewed, while left-leaning outlets comprised fully half of the total. The remainder was split largely between centrist and unrated publications.

To critics, the figures confirm what they have long suspected: that Apple News, far from being a neutral aggregator, operates as an influential editorial gatekeeper whose decisions shape not only what Americans read, but how they understand the political landscape. Julie Mastrine, director of AllSides’ media bias rating system and one of the study’s authors, framed the implications in stark terms.

Apple News’ model, she argued, “inflames political polarization in America by ensconcing readers inside a one-sided bubble of information that can manipulate and blind them.” When users are exposed primarily to a single ideological perspective, she added, it becomes more difficult for citizens to comprehend one another’s viewpoints, deepening mistrust in a society already strained by cultural and political fissures.

The New York Post has been at the forefront of publicizing these concerns, reporting last week on a separate analysis by the conservative watchdog Media Research Center that similarly concluded Apple News was aggressively promoting left-leaning outlets while stifling conservative voices. That earlier report found that the app’s algorithms and editorial choices elevated progressive narratives at the expense of right-of-center perspectives. The Post’s coverage amplified the controversy to the highest levels of government. Within hours of publication, President Donald Trump shared the findings on his Truth Social account, framing them as yet another example of Silicon Valley’s alleged hostility toward conservative viewpoints.

The political ramifications were swift. Federal Trade Commission Chairman Andrew Ferguson sent a formal letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, warning that the company’s practices could place it in violation of consumer protection laws. Ferguson demanded a “comprehensive review” of Apple News’ editorial policies and urged the company to take corrective action without delay.

The New York Post report noted the unusual nature of such regulatory scrutiny directed at a media aggregation service, underscoring the extent to which Apple News’ influence has grown in recent years. With millions of daily users and prominent placement on iPhones and iPads, the app has become a de facto newsstand for a digital age, one whose editorial judgments reverberate across the national conversation.

The AllSides study went further than simply tallying ideological balance. It offered insight into which outlets Apple News appears to favor most heavily. Among the publications that surfaced with greatest frequency were the Wall Street Journal, rated by AllSides as centrist; BuzzFeed, which remains unrated; the Washington Post, categorized as leaning left; and HuffPost, rated as left. By contrast, only two right-leaning outlets appeared at all during the two-week sampling period: Fox News, which was featured three times, and The Telegraph, which appeared once. The New York Post report observed that this disparity is especially notable given the breadth of conservative journalism available in the American media ecosystem, from national newspapers to regional outlets and digital platforms.

Methodologically, AllSides sought to forestall accusations of partisan bias in its own work. The organization employs a multi-partisan panel of experts trained to identify media slant, alongside blind surveys of Americans drawn from across the ideological spectrum. These inputs are averaged to produce ratings for individual outlets. In this instance, AllSides collected Apple News stories at 10 a.m. Eastern Time each day from October 6 through October 19, 2025, in order to maintain consistency. The “Trending” section, which is populated algorithmically based on user engagement, was also examined, though the primary focus remained on “Top Stories,” the editorially curated showcase that greets users when they open the app.

Perhaps most telling is that the new findings mirror AllSides’ earlier assessments of Apple News. A similar analysis conducted in 2023 found that 53% of articles in the “Top News” section came from left-leaning outlets, while just 1% originated from the right. In a broader review of the ten most popular news aggregation services that same year, Apple News was rated as “lean left,” surpassed only by Yahoo News and Bing News in terms of perceived liberal skew. The consistency of these results across multiple years suggests that the patterns observed in 2025 are not anomalies, but reflections of a durable editorial philosophy.

Apple, for its part, has declined to comment on the latest study. When previously confronted with allegations of bias raised by the Media Research Center and reported by The New York Post, the company maintained that Apple News users can tailor their experience by choosing to follow or block specific publications and topics. Yet critics counter that such personalization tools do little to address the outsized influence of the default “Top Stories” section, which functions as the app’s editorial voice and carries disproportionate weight in shaping first impressions of the day’s news.

Behind that editorial voice stands Apple News’ in-house team, led since 2017 by editor-in-chief Lauren Kern. Kern, a veteran of New York Magazine and The New York Times Magazine, was described by The Times in 2018 as having “quietly become one of the most powerful figures in English-language media,” owing to the extraordinary reach of Apple’s platform. The New York Post has repeatedly pointed to this concentration of power as a source of concern, arguing that editorial decisions made by a relatively small team can subtly recalibrate the information diet of millions.

The stakes of this debate extend beyond partisan skirmishes. At issue is the role of technology companies in a democratic society increasingly dependent on digital intermediaries for news consumption. When a platform like Apple News curates content for users who may never seek out alternative viewpoints, it assumes a quasi-journalistic responsibility without the transparency or accountability traditionally associated with newsrooms. The New York Post has argued that such platforms should be held to a higher standard of ideological balance, particularly when they occupy a central position in the information ecosystem.

The controversy also underscores the evolving relationship between media, technology, and regulation. The FTC’s involvement signals a willingness among federal authorities to scrutinize not only how platforms handle data and competition, but how they curate information. While Apple News is not a traditional broadcaster bound by equal-time rules, the questions raised by AllSides suggest a growing appetite for regulatory frameworks that address perceived viewpoint discrimination in the digital public square.

For Apple, the timing could scarcely be worse. The revelation that the app went 99 consecutive days without featuring a conservative news story before finally promoting a Fox News article—an event that occurred just two days after the FTC’s warning letter—has fueled suspicions that editorial adjustments may be reactive rather than principled. Whether this drought was the product of chance, editorial oversight, or structural bias remains an open question, but the optics have done little to reassure skeptics.

In the end, the AllSides study has forced a reckoning with the quiet power exercised by Apple News’ editorial team. The issue is not merely whether conservative outlets receive fair representation, but whether any single ideological current should dominate the curated spaces through which millions of citizens encounter the news. In an era defined by fragmentation and distrust, the credibility of information gatekeepers may hinge on their willingness to reflect the full plurality of voices that constitute the American conversation.