A spokesman for the Duchess described it as a substantial payment based on the newspaper group’s profits from the story, which was agreed and accepted by the Duchess on a confidential basis to avoid the matter having to go back before the court.

The money would be donated to charity, she said.

The Duchess sued Associated Newspapers Limited, also the publisher of MailOnline, over five articles that reproduced parts of a “personal and private” letter to Thomas Markle, her estranged father, in August 2018.

The Duchess won her case last year, when a High Court judge ruled in her favour without a full trial. Court of Appeal judges subsequently dismissed an appeal by Associated Newspapers.

Ian Mill QC said at a court hearing last year that the Duchess was willing to “cap her damages” for misuse of private information “at a nominal award”, if the court would order “an account of profits”.

That was to include evidence of how much the publisher gained financially from its publication of the letter, in relation to the infringement of the Duchess’s copyright.

The newspaper has already issued a printed acknowledgement of the legal ruling.