Texas 2023: Our 25 most engaging stories this year

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As we wrap up this eventful year, we've shared some of our best visual stories and best news photography of 2023. In this post, we're sharing our 25 most engaging stories from the year.

How do we measure engagement? Is it simply the number of times an article was read online — the raw sum of "clicks"? Our analytics and data manager, Alex Powers, came up with an "engagement score" that makes sense for the Tribune and our diverse audiences. That score gives equal weight to four factors: total page views (including AppleNews), total page views within Texas (on the Tribune's web or mobile site), average time spent per article (a data analytics tool we use to assess the reach of our content), and newsletter subscriber conversions — that is, the article or articles a reader was most recently looking at before deciding to subscribe to one of the Tribune's many free newsletters.

We believe this methodology is nuanced enough to present a clear picture of what the year's biggest stories were, from the perspective of readers. Keep in mind, stories about major breaking news developments typically have much higher readership, at least in the short term, than in-depth analytical or investigative articles. Also, although the vast majority of our most engaged readers (and donors) live in Texas, a majority of the Tribune's web traffic comes from outside of Texas — an indication, we think, of the strong interest the rest of America, and the world, has in the Lone Star State. Thanks for reading, and happy new year.