National news focuses on events, issues and developments with a broader scope than local news. This includes national politics, the economy and major disasters. It may also cover international events that impact the nation in some way, such as war. National news can influence and shape public opinion on a wider scale than local news. National newspapers tend to focus on high-profile political happenings, but they can also cover community news such as city council meetings and crime reports.
In television, national news often aired in the late evening hours on major networks, while local news aired in the morning and in the afternoon on smaller stations and cable channels. Some cable channels specialized in national or international news while others focused on specific types of programming such as sports, news and talk shows. Some local network affiliates have their own local newscasts that run for a half-hour or less. These newscasts share the same branding and studio design as the national network’s national newscast.
Other local newscasts air as a standalone segment attached to a national morning network newscast. In the United States, this has included WJLA 24/7 News in the Washington, DC area and NY1 in New York City. In Australia, Seven’s local affiliate WIN produces a number of news bulletins in regional markets (Queensland, New South Wales/Victoria, Tasmania, Canberra and Western Australia) while Nine’s local affiliate SVT has its own 13-minute standalone newscast each weekday evening that is incorporated into its other evening newscast Aktuellt.