The Hill Opens Election Data Tools to Subscribers Ahead of Midterms

More than 75% of The Hill's trial members have converted to paid subscribers, and the publisher is now betting that premium election data tools will push that figure higher ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms. The Hill has rolled out subscriber-only interactive tools and exclusive election coverage as part of its push to grow Hill Insider, the subscription business it launched in July.

Basic membership costs $5.99 per month; the premium tier costs $9.99. The Hill has deliberately kept virtually all of its editorial output free. Instead of a paywall, subscribers get added value: newsletters, live interactive video calls where they can pose questions, and now decision-desk data.

What do subscribers actually get?

The new features open up Decision Desk HQ's election data and analytics tools, expanding a longstanding partnership. Subscribers can dig into polls, local races, prediction models and election trends, track specific races and customize their dashboards. Many of these premium tools are normally reserved for paying professional data analysts, said Bill Sammon, svp of Washington, D.C. editorial content at The Hill.

"We were not going to just take everything that we provide every day to our readers and our viewers and just say, we're putting everything behind the paywall. To the contrary, we kept virtually everything outside the paywall. But we set about to create a new body of content, a value-added body of content that would really serve as the [policy and politics] super fans," Sammon said. "If you can have good journalism, and you can also diversify your revenue stream, that's a win-win."

Why is The Hill diversifying now?

Industrywide declines in referral traffic are pressuring publishers to build direct, paying reader relationships. Sammon said algorithm changes, AI summaries of stories and falling page view counts all factored into the decision. "We did this to make sure we're covered," he said, framing diversification as insulation from being "at the mercy of the algo gods."

The traffic numbers explain the urgency. The Hill's deduplicated desktop and mobile web audience in September 2026 fell 2.9% year over year to 9.6 million U.S. visitors, according to Similarweb data shared with Digiday. That still outperformed rivals: Politico's unique visitors dropped 49.1% and Axios fell 48.8%. By site visits, The Hill was up 3.2% year over year, while Politico declined 44.1% and Axios 47.1%.

Is the election bump real this year?

Sammon declined to share total subscriber numbers but reported a "strong early conversion rate" and "encouraging" engagement with the Decision Desk tools, with page views, visits and unique visitors all trending up.

Arvid Tchivzhel, svp of the digital consulting practice at Mather Economics, pointed to a 2020 report showing election content on the path to conversion more than triples, from 6% in September to a peak of 19% in October. "I am not surprised that September was not as strong," Tchivzhel said. "It could be that interest shifts from an existing audience rather than attracting new audience during election season. Another theory is we are seeing more and more the disintermediation of the legacy news brand from its audience as platforms and LLMs capture the audience relationship."

What comes after the midterms?

Sammon sees subscriptions as additive to The Hill's events, direct and programmatic sales — "just gravy," not yet factored into budgets. After the midterms, The Hill plans to add more interactive elements and is seeking partnerships to drive the business. "You always have to be offering more. You can't be static. You can't be stagnant. You have to be adding material," Sammon said. CNN is pursuing a similar path, recently expanding its subscription service to the U.K. and Canada.