National Geographic Kids

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  National Geographic Kids began not as a glossy magazine but as a weekly school bulletin, quietly mailed to elementary classrooms across America starting in 1919. For more than half a century, the National Geographic Society reached children through that bulletin before deciding, in September 1975, that something bolder was needed. The result was a full children's magazine called National Geographic World. What happened next raises a set of questions worth sitting with: how does a publication built on a no-advertising policy eventually open its pages to commercial sponsors? How does a single magazine grow into atlases, almanacs, and a television channel? And what is it about animals, jokes, and strange facts that keeps more than four million readers returning, issue after issue?

• 2. From Bulletin to World

  ›

  In 1919, the National Geographic Society launched the National Geographic School Bulletin, publishing it weekly during the school year. The bulletin was educational in the strictest sense, designed to reach elementary schoolchildren in a classroom setting rather than at home. That model held for more than five decades. By September 1975, the Society decided the weekly format had run its course, and the Bulletin was discontinued in favor of a proper children's magazine: National Geographic World. World was notably free of advertising, which set it apart from most publications aimed at young readers at the time. That commitment to an ad-free environment shaped the magazine's identity for nearly three decades.

• 3. The Rebrand and Its Sponsors

  ›

  In October 2002, National Geographic World was retitled National Geographic Kids, and the no-advertising policy was dropped. The first advertisers to appear in the newly renamed magazine were The Walt Disney Company, Minolta, Nintendo, Scholastic Corporation, and Tony's Pizza. The arrival of advertising changed the economics of the publication significantly. Around the same time, a classroom-focused spinoff called National Geographic Explorer was launched to preserve the educational-only model that World had originally embodied. In 2007, a separate title called National Geographic Little Kids began publishing six times a year, aimed specifically at preschoolers between the ages of 3 and 6. Then in 2015, National Geographic Partners, a joint venture formed with 21st Century Fox, gained a controlling interest in the Kids brand.

• 4. Reach and Readership

  ›

  As of June 2006, National Geographic Kids reported a circulation of more than 1.3 million copies in English, with an estimated English-language readership of more than 4.6 million. The magazine publishes ten issues per year and is written for children between the ages of 6 and 14. Eighteen non-English editions circulate across an unusually wide spread of countries, including Bulgaria, Croatia, Egypt, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Latin America, Lithuania, the Benelux region, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Turkey, and the United Kingdom. The magazine maintains an advisory board of 500 subscribers and gathers reader feedback after each issue. Both the English and Afrikaans editions published in South Africa moved to digital-only in June 2020, ending a print run of 16 years.

• 5. Features That Kept Kids Reading

  ›

  Two features appear in every single issue without exception: What in the World? and Just Joking. Everything else rotates. The recurring lineup has included Amazing Animals, Kids Did It!, Weird But True, Cool Inventions, Stupid Criminals, Wildlife Watch, and Quiz Whiz, among others. Weird But True eventually expanded well beyond the magazine's pages: it became its own book series in 2010 and later a Disney+ original series under the title Weird But True! A two-page comic series called Unleashed, produced by Strika Entertainment, followed four house pets through their adventures. Fun Stuff, now known by that name, was originally called Kids' Express, and The Inside Scoop ran for years under the earlier title World News.

• 6. Anniversary Issues and Milestones

  ›

  The 25th anniversary issue, published in September 2000, was well publicized at the time. It included a "Top 25" list drawn from reader preferences, with the magazine's own covers ranking first. The issue also gathered cards readers had sent to the magazine over the years and ran a special Kids Did It column that checked in on celebrities who had been featured in the magazine when they were children. Figure skater Michelle Kwan was among those profiled in that reunion feature. Five years later, the 30th anniversary issue in September 2005 turned its attention forward rather than backward: it published an article imagining what daily life might look like in 2035, thirty years into the future, and listed thirty things its writers considered the coolest prospects ahead.

• 7. Beyond the Magazine

  ›

  In 2009, National Geographic Kids launched its first almanac, titled National Geographic Kids Almanac 2010. An updated edition followed the next year, and new versions have appeared annually since. A parallel series of world atlases has gone through six editions: the first four editions built up to the National Geographic Kids Student World Atlas, 4th Ed. in 2014, followed by a fifth edition in 2018 and a sixth in 2021. On television, 2017 saw the launch of two pay and free-to-air channels under the Nat Geo Kids name: one serving Latin America and one operating as a free-to-air satellite channel in Abu Dhabi. The Abu Dhabi channel shut down in 2020, and the Latin American version followed by 2022. The magazine's Washington, D.C. headquarters remains the center of the brand, even as its editions and spinoffs continue to shift.