The New Zealand Herald will next week launch digital subscriptions, showcasing New Zealand's best journalism and commentary.

NZME will become the first major New Zealand media business to unveil digital subscriptions – costing $5 a week, with a special introductory offer to be announced next week.

While much of the content on nzherald.co.nz will remain free, digital subscribers will access a range of premium content across business, politics, news, sport, lifestyle and entertainment including indepth investigations, exclusive reports, columns and analysis. There will also be more foreign, premium content from a range of internationally renowned mastheads.

People who have five-, six- or seven-day subscriptions to the NZ Herald or one of NZME's five regional newspapers – the Northern Advocate, Bay of Plenty Times, Rotorua Daily Post, Hawke's Bay Today and Whanganui Chronicle – will have automatic access to premium content. Print subscribers will be contacted next week with details of how to activate their digital subscription.

"For 156 years, our loyal print subscribers have helped sustain our newsrooms and editorial endeavor," said NZME managing editor Shayne Currie. "Digital subscriptions will help support quality journalism well into the future."

Premium content editor Miriyana Alexander said that each day, NZME's New Zealand newsrooms produced world-class premium content. Recent examples included indepth analysis and insight into our intelligence agencies, gun laws and the government response in the wake of the Christchurch terror attack, and the ongoing Fair Care series, which lifted the lid on injustices in the health system.

"We have plenty more where that came from, and we're looking forward to keeping our audiences up to date on all the stories that matter."

More details of the digital subscription plan – including the introductory offer and the specific launch day – will be announced next week.