I had a discussion with a friend were he claimed that newspaper during that century were merely puppets of the state that wrote nothing but propaganda pieces and that freedom of the press was nonexistant. As an example he said that the battle of Waterloo were reported as a resounding victory for the french in french newspapers. I feel a bit skeptical, so I thought I would ask some experts. Were there major newspapers during that time period that were similar to the standard we have today? Could a person alive during that time read newspapers that gave him a reasonably accurate portrayal of what was going on in the world? And as the title says, how much censorship was there?
I can only speak for Austria, but here's what I know. During the late 18th century, Joseph II insisted a series of liberalizing reforms aiming to not only modernize the Austrian Bureaucracy, but also to encourage freedom of the press and other intellectual freedoms we associate with the Enlightenment. His policies of press freedom though, ended up being curbed in the latter of his reign when newspapers, such as the Wiener Zeitung, criticized his Germanization policies and religious freedoms given to Protestants and Jews. Under his successors, such as Franz II/I, there was far greater censorship of nearly every facet of life, including the press. This is especially clear with the Chancellorship of Metternich, one of the main proponents of conservatism in the post-napoleonic era. Metternich also virtually ruled Austria during the reign of Ferdinand I, due to Ferdinand's mental deficiencies.
When we get to the reign of Franz Joseph in 1848, following the abdication of Ferdinand I, we again see the push towards censorship. Franz Joseph sought to model his rule on the absolutist precedent of Franz II/I, and would push for greater autocracy and censorship within the empire, especially to make sure a revolt such as Hungary's in 1848 would never happen again. This policy can be seen throughout the Habsburg state. In 1860, for example Count Agenor Guluchowski, a minister of state in charge of implementing the new constitution, pushed for heavy censorship of the press through "administrative pressure" on the papers. Ultimately, he was dismissed by Franz Joseph when other ministers realized the untenableness of this plan. Nevertheless, the amount of freedom given to the press would always serve as an issue of contention within the Dual-Monarchy, especially as the bureaucracy had its roots in the liberalism of Joseph.
Sources: John Deak, "Forging a Multinational State: State Making in Imperial Austria from the Enlightenment to the First World War."