The group’s activity is mainly focused on the publication of newspapers, both in Italy and in Spain. Some of these newspapers, like Corriere della Sera in Italy, or Marca in Spain, record very high circulation numbers. In fact, in 2020 RCS MediaGroup was the publishing house holding the second-biggest newspaper market share in Italy. The group also had a solid history as a book publisher in Italy. This activity, however, came to an end in 2015, when RCS’s books division, Rizzoli Libri, was sold to Arnoldo Mondadori Editore.
Diving into the network of newspapers published in Italy by RCS MediaGroup, two of them stand out. The first is Corriere della Sera, also known as "the Via Solferino newspaper" after the street where it is located. Established in 1876, today the newspaper has a very popular online version and it is the leading daily newspaper in Italy in terms of copies sold. The second is La Gazzetta dello Sport, a daily newspaper covering sports, with particular attention to football. In 2019, La Gazzetta dello Sport was the Italian newspaper with the highest number of readers in the country.
As mentioned above, a considerable amount of RCS MediaGroup’s revenue comes from Spain, since it acquired the Spanish publishing group Unidad Editorial in 2007. Unidad Editorial publishes several newspapers and magazines, including the daily economic and business newspaper Expansión. Among these publications, the most important one in terms of audience is undeniably Marca. This sports newspaper focuses primarily on football and is the most read newspaper in the country. Besides sports, Unidad Editorial also publishes one of the most respected daily newspapers in Spain, El Mundo, which had an average circulation of almost 120 thousand copies between 2018 and 2019.