''Paris Match'' () is a

French-language French ( or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. Like all other Romance languages, it descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. French evolved from Northern Old Gallo-Romance, a descendant of the Latin spoken in ...

weekly

gossip magazine A gossip magazine, also referred to as a tabloid magazine, is a magazine that features scandalous stories about the personal lives of celebrities and other well-known individuals. In North America, this genre of magazine flourished in the 1950s ...

. It covers major national and international news along with celebrity lifestyle features. ''Paris Match'' has been considered "one of the world's best outlets for

photojournalism Photojournalism is journalism that uses images to tell a news story. It usually only refers to still images, but can also refer to video used in broadcast journalism. Photojournalism is distinguished from other close branches of photography (such ...

". Its content quality was compared to the American magazine ''

Life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, Structure#Biological, organisation, met ...

''. ''Paris Match''s original slogan was "The weight of words, the shock of photos", which was changed to "Life is a true story" in 2008. The magazine was sold by Lagardère to LVMH in 2024.

History and profile

A sports news magazine, ''Match l'intran'' (a play on '' L'Intransigeant''), was launched on 9 November 1926 by Léon Bailby. It was acquired by the Louis-Dreyfus group in 1931 and then by the industrialist Jean Prouvost in 1938. Under Prouvost the magazine expanded its focus beyond sports, to a format reminiscent of ''

'': ''Le Match de la vie'' ("The Match of Life") and then ''Match, l'hebdomadaire de l'actualité mondiale'' ("Match, the weekly of world news"). Following the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

it became ''Match de la guerre'' ("Match of War") in October 1939. Selling for 2 francs a copy, it reached a circulation of 1.45 million by November. Publication was halted on 6 June 1940, during the

Battle of France The Battle of France (; 10 May – 25 June 1940), also known as the Western Campaign (), the French Campaign (, ) and the Fall of France, during the Second World War was the Nazi Germany, German invasion of the Low Countries (Belgium, Luxembour ...

. The magazine was relaunched in 1949 with a new name, ''Paris Match''. The magazine temporarily ceased publication between 18 May and 15 June 1968 upon the call for a strike by the Syndicat du Livre, the French printers' union. In 1976,

Daniel Filipacchi Daniel Filipacchi (born 12 January 1928) is the Chairman Emeritus of Hachette Filipacchi Médias and a French collector of surrealist art. Career Filipacchi wrote and worked as a photographer for '' Paris Match'' from its founding in 1949 b ...

purchased the ailing ''Paris Match''. It continues to be one of France's most successful and influential magazines. It is published weekly and was until October 2024 part of

Hachette Filipacchi Médias Hachette Filipacchi Médias, S.A. (HFM) is a magazine publisher. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lagardère Active, a division of the media conglomerate Lagardère Group of France. History '' Hachette'' was founded by Louis Hachette (Fre ...

, which is itself owned by the

Lagardère Group Lagardère S.A. () is an international group with operations in over 40 countries. Based in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, the group was founded and created in 1992 by Jean-Luc Lagardère under the name Matra, Hachette & Lagardère. Headed ...

. On occasion, ''Paris Match'' has sold more than one million copies worldwide when covering major events, such as the first flight by a French

astronaut An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a List of human spaceflight programs, human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member of a spa ...

, Patrick Baudry, aboard the U.S.

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

Discovery Discovery may refer to: * Discovery (observation), observing or finding something unknown * Discovery (fiction), a character's learning something unknown * Discovery (law), a process in courts of law relating to evidence Discovery, The Discovery ...

in June 1985. Benoît Clair, a senior writer for ''Paris Match'', was the first journalist allowed to join the shuttle crew members from training until the departure for the launch pad at

Cape Canaveral Cape Canaveral () is a cape (geography), cape in Brevard County, Florida, in the United States, near the center of the state's Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast. Officially Cape Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, it lies east of Merritt Island, separated ...

. A series of reports on the training was published in ''Paris Match'' on 22 April 1985, 17 June 1985 and 20 January 1986. As of 1996 the magazine has adopted an independent political stance. In February 2024, it was publicly disclosed that the luxury brand LVMH is in talks to purchase Paris Match from the media conglomerate Lagardère SA. LVMH purchased the magazine in October of 2024 for €120 million.

Circulation

''Paris Match'' had a circulation of 1,800,000 copies in 1958. The 1988 circulation of the magazine was 873,000, making it the best-selling news weekly in the country. In 2001 the weekly was the tenth-largest-circulation news magazine worldwide, with a 630,000 sale. ''Paris Match'' had a circulation of 655,000 during the 2007–2008 period. In 2009 the magazine was the best-selling photonews magazine in France, with a circulation of 611,000 copies. Its circulation was 578,282 in 2014 and 568,115 in 2020.

In popular culture

Hergé Georges Prosper Remi (; 22 May 1907 – 3 March 1983), known by the pen name Hergé ( ; ), from the French pronunciation of his reversed initials ''RG'', was a Belgian comic strip artist. He is best known for creating ''The Adventures of T ...

's Tintin adventure '' The Castafiore Emerald'' (1963), reporters from the imaginary "''Paris-Flash''" magazine (a clear spoof on ''Paris Match'', with a similar logo) play a major role in the plot's development. The magazine is satirized as sensationalist and inaccurate.

References

External links

* {{LVMH 1949 establishments in France French-language magazines LVMH Magazines established in 1949 Magazines published in Paris News magazines published in France Photojournalistic magazines Weekly magazines published in France Weekly news magazines