Eight people, including Rebekah Brooks and Andy Coulson, will face a total of 19 charges relating to phone hacking, the Crown Prosecution Service has said.
The former News of the World editors will be charged in connection with the accessing of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler’s phone messages.
Seven face charges of conspiring to intercept communications between 13 October 2001 and 9 August 2006.
An inquiry was launched after details of phone hacking at the NoW emerged.
The revelation that the schoolgirl’s phone had been hacked led to the closure of the Sunday tabloid newspaper in July last year.
Mrs Brooks, who is also a former News International chief executive, faces three charges relating to the alleged accessing the voicemails of Milly Dowler and former trade union boss Andrew Gilchrist, CPS legal adviser Alison Levitt QC said.
Mr Coulson, the prime minister’s former communications chief, will face four charges linked to accusations of accessing the phone messages of Milly Dowler, David Blunkett, Charles Clarke and George Best’s son Calum Best.
The others facing charges are former NoW managing editor Stuart Kuttner, former news editor Greg Miskiw, former assistant editor Ian Edmondson, former chief reporter Neville Thurlbeck, former assistant editor James Weatherup and private investigator Glenn Mulcaire.
Ms Levitt said that 13 files had been passed to the CPS by the Metropolitan Police and she had decided that there was a “realistic prospect of conviction” in relation to eight of them.
All of the suspects apart from Mr Mulcaire will be charged with conspiring to intercept communications without lawful authority.
Prosecutors will allege that more than 600 people, including Hollywood actors Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, were victims of this offence.
Other victims of alleged hacking named in connection with the charges were former MP David Blunkett, Sven-Goran Eriksson, Abi Titmuss and John Leslie, Delia Smith, Jude Law, Sadie Frost and Sienna Miller, and Wayne Rooney.
The CPS said it would be taking no further action against five other previous suspects.