Helsingin Sanomat, abbreviated HS and colloquially known as Hesari, is the largest subscription newspaper in Finland and the Nordic countries, owned by Sanoma.

[3] Political censorship by the Russian authorities, prompted by the paper's strong advocacy of greater Finnish freedoms and even outright independence, forced Päivälehti to often temporarily suspend publication, and finally to close permanently in 1904.

For instance, during the run-up to the Winter War, Eljas Erkko was at the same time the paper's publisher and Finland's foreign minister.

Helsingin Sanomat strongly advocated Finland joining the European Union in the run-up to the decision to do so in 1994.

[13] After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the newspaper established a Russian-language news website to cover the war.

[15] Helsingin Sanomat is published daily in Finnish in compact format with the exception of the days after public holidays when the paper does not appear.

[21] Approximately 75% of households in the Helsinki metropolitan area subscribe to Helsingin Sanomat, and it functions as the region's local paper.

[10] Pertti Klemola, a Finnish journalist and scholar, once called it a state authority, an institution with its own independent social and political will.

[25] The International Edition launched on 14 September 1999 with the aim of informing readers of news from Finland during the Finnish presidency of the European Union.

[26] It continued after the European presidency owing to the quantity of readers it was getting became one of the major English-language sources of news regarding Finland—making it popular with English-speaking immigrants to the country.