What are the most popular sections on MSN News?

1. “Top Stories” is promoted as the central entry point and therefore the de facto most‑seen section

MSN and Microsoft surface “Top Stories” prominently across interfaces—from the MSN homepage to Microsoft Edge widgets and the MSN news widget—which ensures Top Stories is the most consistently displayed feed element and thus the most likely to be seen by the largest audience ^{[5] [6]}. Microsoft’s support pages and product descriptions repeatedly describe Top Stories as the place for breaking and essential headlines, and the Edge/MSN widget explicitly delivers “Top Stories” into the OS‑level notification tray for millions of users ^{[5] [7]}.

2. A stable core of sections appears across Microsoft and third‑party descriptions

Official MSN descriptions and independent media profiles list a recurring set of sections: Top stories, U.S., World, Politics, Money/Finance, Technology, Entertainment, Opinion, Sports and Crime, among a few ancillary categories—these are presented as the structural backbone of MSN’s news product ^{[1] [2]}. Microsoft’s own product pages and support articles also reference specialized verticals like MSN Finance and themed editorial products ^{[4] [7]}, indicating these categories are both editorial and product priorities.

3. Personalization and ranking systems blur a single “most popular” answer

MSN does not deliver a static homepage for every user; the feed refreshes on each view and content is ranked by a mix of editorial oversight, algorithmic signals and user behavior—click‑through, freshness, publisher authority and negative signals such as clickbait all shape what appears higher in individual feeds ^[3]. Microsoft explicitly states that ranking is designed to deliver relevant and timely items tailored to each person, which implies section consumption will vary widely by user preference and location rather than reflecting a single universal ordering ^{[3] [4]}.

4. Interface mechanics and partnerships shape visibility more than pure editorial choice

MSN’s “today stripe,” mega menu and service stripes highlight trending and popular topics across the site, and agreements with content partners sometimes redirect users to originating publisher pages—both practices affect which sections receive traffic independent of traditional readership metrics ^{[6] [7]}. Third‑party descriptions of MSN as an aggregator emphasize that stories from well‑known national and global publishers are weighted more heavily for perceived authority, a design choice that can amplify certain sections (politics, world, money) when major outlets dominate coverage ^{[3] [2]}.

5. What the available reporting cannot tell a reader and why that matters

Publicly available sources document section names, UI prominence and the ranking logic, but none provide a transparent, cross‑platform metric of section popularity (no section‑level traffic table is published in the cited materials) so any definitive list of “most popular sections” would be speculation beyond these documents ^{[1] [3]}. External traffic reporting confirms MSN’s overall high reach as an aggregator but does not break popularity down by internal sections in the material provided here ^[8]. Therefore the strongest, evidence‑based conclusions are that Top Stories is the most universally surfaced feed and that core sections (U.S., World, Money, Technology, Entertainment, Sports, Opinion, Crime) form MSN’s consistent structure—while actual popularity ranks are individualized and algorithmically determined ^{[5] [1] [3]}.

Conclusion

MSN’s product and public documentation identify a stable set of sections and promote “Top Stories” as the principal headline surface, but the company’s algorithmic personalization and publisher partnerships mean there is no single published ranking of which internal sections are most popular across every user; available sources support claims about structure and prominence, not about definitive, cross‑user popularity metrics ^{[1] [3] [5]}.