The seven sites and publishers audited by ABCe got a total 153.7 million uniques in October, bouncing back from some consecutive January-to-August declines that reached as low as 135.5 million.

But Guardian.co.uk and Telegraph - two of the three biggest-hitting sites, all of which are almost tied at above 30 million uniques - saw traffic fall, while Independent.co.uk, Mirror Group and Times Online increased traffic, contributing to the aggregate rise.

So the newspaper sites now boast big traffic. But the record comes as some papers begin to see futility in piling on ever more uniques without capitalising by making greater commercial returns.

One other point - Times Online (currently fourth in the pissing contest) can expect to see its 20.87 million users slim significantly once the paywall goes up in 2010.