Guide · Updated 13 November 2026

How to tell if a news article has been edited

Online articles can change after you've read them. Here's how to check whether a story has been updated, what changed, and when, using tools anyone can reach.

1. Look for an "Updated" time near the byline

Most news sites show a publish time and, if the story changed, an "Updated" time. That tells you something changed, but not what. Some sites update the time for tiny fixes; others don't show it at all.

2. Scroll to the bottom for a correction or editor's note

When a newsroom fixes a factual error, the usual practice is to add a note, often at the end of the story, that says what was wrong. A line starting "Correction:", "Clarification:" or "Editor's note:" is your strongest clue. If the story changed in a meaningful way and there's no note, that's worth noticing.

3. Check the page's hidden "last modified" date

Many article pages carry a machine-readable modified date that search engines read. On a computer, open the page, choose View Page Source, and search for dateModified or modified_time. If it's later than the publish date, the page was edited. Like the visible timestamp, it won't tell you what changed, and some sites don't update it.

4. Compare against an archived copy

The Internet Archive's Wayback Machine saves copies of many news pages. Paste the article's link in to see saved snapshots, then compare an early one with the current page. archive.today works the same way and is often used to save a page at a moment in time.

The catch: archives only help if someone saved the page before it changed, and snapshots are taken irregularly. Google used to offer a "Cached" copy of pages, but it retired that feature in 2024, so it's no longer an option.

5. Compare the headline people shared

Headlines change more than any other part of a story. Social media posts, link previews and newsletters often keep the original headline. If the headline someone shared doesn't match the one on the page, it was probably rewritten.

6. Save your own copy when it matters

If you're quoting a story or may need it later, save it yourself: submit it to the Wayback Machine ("Save Page Now"), or print it to PDF with the date visible.

Why this is harder than it should be

None of these methods shows you the change itself, word by word, unless someone happened to save the right version at the right time. That gap is why NewsFacts exists: we save each version of stories from dozens of outlets automatically, within minutes of publication, and compare them. See how it works.

A note on fairness

Most edits are ordinary journalism. Breaking stories are updated as facts arrive, headlines are sharpened, typos fixed. An edit isn't evidence of bad faith. What matters is whether meaningful changes, especially corrections of fact, are made openly. How corrections are supposed to work.