The free printed monthly newspaper is distributed around the UVic campus and various locations around greater Victoria.
The Martlet has a wide circulation and can be found in coffee shops, theatres, grocery stores, offices, and street corners throughout Victoria, British Columbia.
Many national journalists and columnists in Canada have gotten their start at the Martlet, and it continues to produce opportunities for student writers to become professionals.
Martleteers have gone on to become journalists and editors at the National Post, Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, Edmonton Journal, Times Colonist, and other Canadian news outlets.
5,000 printed copies are circulated around the UVic campus and the local community, and the Martlet has over 3,600 followers on X (Twitter) and 1,900 on Facebook[when?].
For a brief period in the early 1970s, the Martlet was renamed the 'Cougar City Gazette' after an armed takeover by a loose coalition of disgruntled former students and at least one former(?)
professor who were dissatisfied with the perceived blandness of the newspaper - perusal of the content of the Cougar City Gazette clearly reflects the change of editorial direction.
The Cougar City Gazette was often quite controversial, and itclosed suddenly after it published a captioned photograph that caused Playboy magazine to threaten the paper with legal action.
The Martlet has received criticism for running advertisements that some readers have interpreted as sexist, notably in fall 2004 when they ran ads for "Canada's Search for the Coors Light Maxim Girl."