50 Best Magazines

The Tempo staff at the Chicago Tribune have, for the third year running, compiled their own list of their 50 best magazines: “our personal favorites, drawn from the titles that clutter our cubicles, litter our nightstands or just, frankly, fire us.”

Here’s a quick list of the top 25.

1. Blender – “Finally, America has a music magazine that unites the zippy, irreverent writing of the best British music press with the serious reporting and terrific profiles that can still occasionally be found in the depleted Rolling Stone.”
2. National Geographic Traveler – “NGT devotes itself to one thing, travel — and nobody does it better.”
3. Vanity Fair – “Some of the best magazine journalism in the country.”
4. Wired.
5. Cook’s Illustrated.
6. New York. “The style, the energy, the elbow in your side that says, ‘Get outta my way!’”
7. People – “Admit it: You read it.”
8. Vogue.
9. People en Espanol – “Often better than its American sibling. Muy bien!”
10. Metropolis – “The smart one in the good suit with the wire glasses.”
11. Shop Etc.
12. Make – “Hopes to turn digital living from a spectator sport.”
13. Newsweek/Time.
14. Top Gear – “Hail, Britannia… they rule the world of cheeky car magazines.”
15. National Geographic.
16. Fine Gardening.
17. The Atlantic Monthly.
18. Entertainment Weekly.
19. Esquire.
20. The New Yorker.
21. Paste.
22. Country Living.
23. Consumer Reports.
24. GQ.
25. Armchair General.

Chicago Tribune