Guardian Media Group sustainability score: 61/100
Guardian Media Group publishes The Guardian in print and online and is owned by the Scott Trust; reader revenue is 63% of its income and advertising 22%. It sold The Observer in 2025.
More about Guardian Media Group
Guardian Media Group plc was incorporated in 1907. It had about 1,630 employees and £282.1 million revenue in its year to March 2026.
Founded 1907Head office London, UKStaff ~1,632 (The Scott Trust group, FY to Mar 2026 average)Revenue ~£282.1M revenue (FY to Mar 2026)Website ↗
Guardian Media Group's footprint fell 48% from 2019/20 to 17,789 tCO2e in 2024/25, mostly because it prints fewer newspapers; print is still just under two-thirds of the total. It says its target, a 67% cut across all scopes by 2030 without counting offsets, is SBTi-validated, and its London office electricity is renewable. Its own operations' emissions and business travel are rising, and it publishes no water data.
Guardian Media Group scores 61/100 (Leading practice) on SINK's independent climate assessment, scored from public data only. Scores are free. Companies can never pay for anything about their own score. Last verified November 2026.
That places Guardian Media Group joint 8th of 934 companies scored, and 1st of 28 in Media / Entertainment / Publishing.
What is Guardian Media Group doing well, and where does it fall short?
Strongest on Controversies & Red Flags and Carbon Footprint: Operations (8/10, 7/10). Weakest on Water Impact and Nature & Biodiversity Impact (3/10, 5/10).
Where Guardian Media Group lost points
For each question that lost points, the evidence our public rubric looks for that we didn't find.
- Emissions from its own operations7/10Its own emissions aren't independently verified or tracked over several years.
- Emissions from its supply chain7/10No full value-chain map or supplier engagement programme.
- Whether its emissions are falling7/10No consistent fall over several years across its operations and supply chain.
- How clean its energy is6/10Less than 90% of its energy shown to be renewable.
- Its effect on nature5/10Its effect on nature isn't measured or independently verified.
- How it uses materials and handles waste5/10No measurable waste or recycling targets reported publicly.
- Its effect on water3/10No monitoring of water use, or no measures to reduce it.
- Its climate targets7/10Its targets aren't validated by the Science Based Targets initiative.
- How openly it reports7/10No annual impact report, or no pay linked to climate targets.
A score changes when the evidence does. We use new published evidence at the next rescore. Anyone can send us new evidence, free. How to send it.
How is Guardian Media Group's SINK score calculated?
Same ten questions for every company. No private weighting.
SINK = (0.3 × Base + 0.7 × Performance) × ScaleWhat evidence is Guardian Media Group's score based on?
10 sources used in this assessment. All publicly available. Each row shows which of the ten questions it informed.
20% of them were published by Guardian Media Group itself; the rest come from independent sources.
“Scope 1 Emissions from gas and refrigerants 654 1,615 649 286 310 358”
“We work with 51toCarbonZero, an environmental consultancy, to measure and report our global GHG”
“printed at sites using 100% renewable”
“we also take into consideration the suppliers’ emissions per tonne of paper”
“GMG found it produced 23,907 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e) emissions in the year to March 2022”
“Certified Since October 2019”
“The Guardian will no longer accept advertising from oil and gas companies as the media group looks to cut its links with fossil fuel firms.”
“Tortoise Media has also agreed a five-year commercial agreement with GMG, which will see it pay for both print and distribution services”
“These figures do not include the impact of selling The Observer”
“The Company's disclosures with regards to streamlined energy and carbon reporting are included with”
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How does Guardian Media Group compare with other media / entertainment / publishing companies?
Guardian Media Group is the highest-scoring media / entertainment / publishing company we've rated.
Among the 28 major media / entertainment / publishing brands we've scored, Guardian Media Group sits 1st of 28.
Who comes next in Media / Entertainment / Publishing?
Guardian Media Group leads its sector. These are the next 3 down.
Rightmove reports operational emissions cut 43% since 2020 through renewable electricity, but total footprint rose 12% due to rising Scope 3 spend-based supply-chain emissions, unverified and growing.
See the breakdown →Pearson has cut absolute emissions 57% since 2018 and holds SBTi-validated targets through 2050.
See the breakdown →The BBC's footprint was 345,018 tCO2e in 2025/26, mostly the programmes and services it buys, down from 404,102 t in 2019/20, partly because it made fewer productions.
See the breakdown →Which companies moved this week, and why.
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