The 48pp tabloid, a slimmed-down version of the 72pp Evening Standard, features 40pp of colour and is to be distributed across central London between 11.30am and 2.30pm.

The title is printed flexo on the KBA Flexo Courier presses at Harmsworth Quays, the Docklands print site owned by Associated Newspapers.

Standard Lite is designed to revive the fortunes of the evening paper which has lost 41,000 readers, or 10% of its readership, in the last 12 months.

It features 12 pages of pared-down news, with a majority of space given over to lifestyle features in a bid to attract a mostly female population of 600,000 London workers who leave their offices at lunchtime but do not buy a paper.

The hope is that these readers will develop a taste for the free edition of the newspaper, which will contain no supplements, before graduating to the full-price 40p edition.

The launch also pre-empts any further entries into the London freesheet market.

Express Newspapers boss Richard Desmond's long-awaited free evening paper is still awaiting a ruling from the Office of Fair Trading on distribution rights in the London Underground. A decision is now expected in the New Year.

Express Newspapers had no comment to make on the Standard Lite launch.

It is understood that Metro International, the green-top morning freesheet that operates in major cities around the world, is also considering a London launch.

Story by Josh Brooks