Media exhibition stand at Macworld iWorld Asia (MIA) in Beijing, Sept 24, 2011. [Photo/IC]

Chinadaily.com.cn is the most visited news website in the country, attracting an average of 8.19 million unique visitors per day in March, according to a report by consulting firm iResearch.

The bilingual online interactive platform of China's first English-language newspaper topped the ranking with a daily reach rate of 3.2 percent among Chinese Internet users, said the Beijing-based consultancy.

It is ranked fourth by users' time spent on the website, 7.1 million hours in March, according to the report.

The survey focuses only on vertical news websites run by media organizations and excludes sites such as sina.com, sina.com, netease.com and qq.com who were classified as comprehensive sites, as they offer a large scope of services including online games, video streaming and blogs as well as information, according iResearch.

The monthly survey takes a contracted sample of around 400,000 to 450,000 Internet users, who are proportionally selected by age, gender and region according to statistics from the China Internet Network Information Center, said Liang Min, researcher at iResearch.

People.com.cn, the official website of People's Daily, is second in unique visitors, grabbing 3 percent of Chinese Internet users' attention, and first in hours spent on the website.

Youth.cn, sponsored by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League, took third spot after chinadaily.com.cn and people.com.cn with 7.73 million unique visitors a day in March.