The magazine was advertised as "selected reading to delight, instruct, and entertain," offering "the cream of new stories for boys and girls, reprints of the best-loved classics.

For many years Children's Digest was printed on light green paper, which the publisher claimed avoided eye strain while reading.

[2] A 1951 newspaper story stated Children's Digest contained an average of 40 pages of special comics dramatizing classic novels such as Gulliver's Travels and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

[5] These reprints increased Tintin's popularity in the United States for, at the time, Children's Digest had a circulation of around 700,000 copies monthly.

[1] In 1980 Children's Digest was sold to the Benjamin Franklin Literary and Medical Society, a nonprofit organization that purchased numerous magazines, including The Saturday Evening Post, Humpty Dumpty, Child Life and Jack and Jill.