Guide
Overview
The Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times are Illinois' two big city dailies, the Sun-Times now run as a nonprofit with WBEZ. The Daily Herald covers the suburbs, and the State Journal-Register in Springfield, the Peoria Journal Star, the Rockford Register Star, the Belleville News-Democrat, the News-Gazette in Champaign, the Pantagraph in Bloomington, the Southern Illinoisan in Carbondale and the Quad-City Times cover downstate. Capitol News Illinois covers state government for papers across the state.
Illinois newspapers carry the legal notices the state requires for foreclosures, estates and government actions, publish obituaries for 102 counties, and hold court coverage that pairs with the circuit clerks' online case searches.
Official sources on this page were checked on September 25, 2026.
Guide
Illinois Newspapers
Find local and statewide newspaper publications for Illinois. Access news, sports, classified, entertainment, and archived articles.
Guide
Major Illinois newspapers and what they cover
The Tribune covers Chicago, Cook County, the Daley Center courts, the federal court and the legislature, with back issues from the 1840s onward in the digital archives. The Sun-Times covers the same city with a focus on courts and crime. The Daily Herald covers DuPage, Lake, Kane and McHenry counties, the State Journal-Register covers the Capitol and Sangamon County, and the downstate dailies cover their circuit courts and county boards. Weeklies such as the Shaw Local papers in the Illinois Valley and the Paddock papers in the suburbs carry village boards, police blotters and probate notices.
Guide
Historic Illinois newspapers online
The Illinois Digital Newspaper Collections at the University of Illinois offer free digitized titles from across the state, and Illinois papers appear in Chronicling America. The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library in Springfield holds the largest Illinois newspaper microfilm collection and offers a free Illinois newspaper index. The Chicago Public Library provides free access to the Tribune and Sun-Times archives with a library card, and the Newberry Library holds early Chicago titles.
Guide
Legal notices, public notices and obituaries in Illinois
Illinois law requires foreclosure sale notices, probate claim notices, name changes, assumed business names, tax sales and county and municipal notices to run in a newspaper of general circulation in the county, and the Illinois Press Association collects them in a statewide search. Obituaries run in every daily and most weeklies, and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library's newspaper index covers older deaths downstate. Court coverage pairs with the circuit clerk case searches that most Illinois counties post online.
Guide
Browse Newspapers by State
Straight answers
Illinois Newspaper Directory, questions
What are the main newspapers in Illinois?
The Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times in the city, the Daily Herald in the suburbs, and the State Journal-Register, the Peoria Journal Star, the Rockford Register Star and the Belleville News-Democrat downstate.
Where can I search Illinois legal notices?
At Public Notice Illinois, the Illinois Press Association's statewide database of foreclosure, probate, assumed name and government notices published in Illinois newspapers.
Where are historic Illinois newspapers online?
The Illinois Digital Newspaper Collections at the University of Illinois are free, and Chronicling America and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library add more.