Washington Times Paywall: How to Read Washington Times Articles for Free

The Washington Times is a conservative daily newspaper in Washington, DC. Founded in 1982, it has always been the smaller of the capital's two general dailies, but its political reporting, its national security coverage and its opinion pages are widely read on the right and widely quoted in Congress and on cable news. The paper introduced a metered paywall on its website, so readers who follow a link from social media or a search result now meet a subscription prompt after a handful of stories. This guide explains how the meter works and how to read a full article.

A note before going further. The Washington Times is a different newspaper from The Washington Post, the much larger paper owned by Jeff Bezos. They share a city and nothing else. The Post has a hard paywall that serves only a teaser, and it does not work through the reader. Our Washington Post guide explains why and lists the alternatives. This guide is about the Times.

How the Washington Times paywall works

The Washington Times runs a metered paywall. In a letter from the editor explaining the change, the paper set the allowance at six free articles or columns a month for non-subscribers. Once you pass that, a subscription prompt covers the page. Print subscribers get full digital access included, and digital-only subscriptions are sold on their own.

The gate is enforced in the browser. The article text is delivered in the page so that search engines can index it, and a script then counts your visits in a cookie and swaps the body for the subscription box once you are over the limit. A reader that fetches the page without running that script receives the complete article. Our explainer on metered versus hard paywalls sets out why that distinction matters, and the Times sits firmly on the softer side of it, which is the opposite of the Post.

Our tests on 23 October 2026 through Skip the Paywall:

• A 510-word Washington Times news story on the release of American Stephen Hubbard from Russia after more than four years in prison, announced by President Trump, loaded in full, all 19 paragraphs.
• An 846-word Washington Times opinion column on why women's reaction to the Lindsay Clancy case should terrify us loaded in full, all 25 paragraphs.
• A 2,301-word Washington Times investigation into China still shipping fentanyl precursors to Mexican cartels through criminal networks loaded in full, all 79 paragraphs.

Read a Washington Times article in full

• Copy the article link. Washington Times links look like washingtontimes.com/news/2026/oct/21/ followed by the headline as a slug, and opinion pieces use the same pattern.
• Paste it into the box on the home page and press Read Article.
• The story appears in a clean reader view with the headline, byline and full text.

The reader shows the text the publisher serves. The Times delivers the whole article in the page, which is why every test loaded in full, including a long investigation.

Other approaches

• Newsletters. The Washington Times sends free daily email briefings that summarise the day's stories and link to them.
• Private windows. The six-article meter is stored in a cookie, so a private browser window resets the count.
• Primary sources. The paper's national security and congressional reporting draws heavily on public documents, hearing transcripts, State Department statements and court filings, all of which are published free.
• The print edition. Print subscribers get full digital access, so if you already take the paper, log in rather than counting articles.

How it compares with other Washington papers

Washington's political press behaves very differently from title to title. The Washington Post does not work and serves only a teaser. The Washington Examiner, the other conservative daily in the capital, locks its premium pieces but delivers the text in the page and comes through the reader. The Times sits with the Examiner on that count. The full list of sites that work is kept current.

Subscribe if you read it regularly

The Washington Times keeps a newsroom in the capital covering Congress, the Pentagon and the White House every day, and six free articles a month does not go far if you follow national politics closely. If you read it regularly, a digital subscription is the right way to keep that reporting going.