Print subscriptions may be in  a steep decline for newspapers and magazines but e-reader subscriptions are generally showing a healthy growth rate.

From Business Insider

The Wall Street Journal has by far the highest e-reader circulation of any newspaper in the U.S., according to Audit Bureau of Circulations data cited in a recent report by the World Association of Newspapers.

The Journal had generated 414,025 e-subscriptions as of April 2010, up 8% from 383,199 in April 2009.

By comparison, The New York Times ranks No. 3 on the report’s list of the top 25 e-reader circulations, with 90,934 downloaded as of this April versus 43,844 as of last.

(UPDATE: See comments for some noteworthy clarifications.)

As we’ve recently reported, The Journal is also killing it in the iPad department, with more than 10,000 subscriptions sold, and $2.4 million in revenue generated from them, as of June. The Journal’s iPad app costs $17.99/month. The Times’ is free.

The Detroit Free Press edged out The Times in the No. 2 spot with 105,210 subscriptions. Last year, that paper ranked No. 17 with 15,776 subscriptions. (In December 2008, the Detroit Free Press announced it would be scaling back its home-delivered print edition to three days a week, which probably accounts for the massive jump in e-subscriptions.)

Interestingly, Women’s Wear Daily, the fashion, retail and media trade pub, also made the list, ranking No. 22 with 22,474 subscriptions.

And here are the rankings:

The figures can be slightly misleading for publications that bundle their e-reader subscriptions with the regular print edition but the numbers for the Journal are impressive and demonstrate how people want their news delivered.

The Journal has deftly managed to attract subscribers and revenues to it’s e-reader edition and left other newspapers in the dust.  But as more types of Kindle like reading devices become available I think we will see people flock to the new model of e-reading.

I have been reading the New York Times on a Kindle DX for three months now and it ahs been a great experience.  I can now “carry” an entire newspaper or actually several days worth of the paper in a device that fits right in my briefcase and can be read under virtually almost any condition.

Plus I don’t have to worry about recycling the old papers and the e-subscription costs less than half of the home delivery price meaning that the Kindle will have paid for itself within a year.

The e-reader subscription is here to stay the real question is whether or not they will attract enough paid subscribers to keep some publications from failing.

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