The Guardian has announced plans to launch a digital European edition, addressing what it says is its second-most engaged market.

The new edition – which joins those for Australia and the US – will be the first new foreign edition for eight years.

Ten of the planned editorial positions have already been filled, with a first edition planned for the northern autumn. Staffing comes from a mix of internal and external appointments and existing correspondents will also contribute.

As in Australia and the US, visitors to the site will see a localised home page as the UK publisher responds to what it says is “a need for trusted, independent English-language news that connects with European readers”.

The Guardian says European readers are now its most engaged audience group outside of the UK, “representing a strong share of its global readership and supporter growth”.

It received more than 250 million page views from Europe last year, 129 per cent more than in 2016, and reaches 25 million unique browsers a month there, up 41 per cent on 2016. The audience size rates third after the UK and US.

Guardian News and Media chief executive Anna Bateson says there is a “significant opportunity” to grow further internationally. “We have ambitious plans to build on our growing European audience, to serve them better and persuade both readers and advertisers to support the Guardian’s world-class journalism.”

The Guardian’s history dates to 1821 when it was launched as the Manchester Guardian, and it has been owned by the Scott Trust since 1936.

The US digital edition, launched in 2007, now contributes a quarter of its reader revenue in what Bateson says is its fastest-growing market. The Australian website was launched in 2013, and an international homepage followed in 2015.

New full-colour presses in London took the paper’s print edition to a Berliner format in 2005, but this was abandoned in favour of tabloid after the publisher failed to gain external print contracts, and the plant sold (mailroom equipment from the site is now in use at News Corp’s print centre in Truganina, Melbourne).

Lizzy Davies has been named as European news editor with former homepage editor Kirsty McEwen as deputy digital editor.

• Revenue from Australia and New Zealand grew 24 per cent to £27.8 million (A$52.94 million), according to new full-year results for Guardian Media Group. Total revenue for the group , which includes The Guardian and The Observer increased 3.4 per cent to £264.4 million (A$503.64 million) for the year ended April 2, 2023. International revenue, at £93.2 million, provides more than a third of GMG’s income.

Bateson says the Guardian is becoming “truly global” with more than a million paying digital supporters in addition to print subscribers and one-off contributions.