Active subscriptions for telecommunications providers throughout the networks of MTN, Airtel, Globacom, and T2 crossed the 200 million mark in September 2026, the highest since 2024.
According to the newest business knowledge launched by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), active mobile subscriptions in the nation stood at 200,102,038 on the finish of the month, about 3 million enhance from 197.1 million recorded in August.
The final time Nigeria’s mobile subscription stood above 200 million was in April 2024 earlier than the NCC’s NIN-SIM linkage enforcement that introduced whole database right down to 171.8 million in May 2024.
MTN accounts for greater than half of subscriptions
MTN Nigeria stays the dominant pressure in the mobile market because it gained over 2 million new subscriptions in the month to shut September with 104.6 million active connections.
- With that, MTN’s share of the market now stood at 52.3%, leaving the opposite three operators to share lower than 48%.
- Airtel Nigeria additionally recorded 618,660 new subscriptions in the month, which introduced its database to 68 million.
- As the second largest operator by subscriber quantity, Airtel accounts for 34% of the market share.
- Globacom additionally recorded a marginal enhance in subscriptions for the month however stays a distant third operator with simply 11.89% market share. The telco’s database grew from 23.5 million in August to 23.8 million in September.
For the struggling T2, issues haven’t improved regardless of a current nationwide roaming with MTN. NCC’s knowledge reveals that the telco’s subscriptions have remained static over the past three months at 3.6 million.
T2 accounts for only one.89% share of the mobile market as of September 2026.
Nigeria’s web subscriptions rise
Meanwhile, active subscriptions for the web throughout mobile, fastened and VOIP networks in Nigeria rose to 160.9 million in September.
This was pushed largely by web subscription on the mobile networks, which jumped from 158 million in August to 160.4 million in September.
Fixed wi-fi connections elevated from 227,910 in August to 248,651 in September. VoIP subscriptions declined from 226,766 in August to 223,843 in September. However, ISP knowledge has not been up to date for September.
How mobile subscriptions fall under 200 million
The telecom business noticed a huge drop in subscriptions after the verification of the National Identification Numbers (NINs) linked with mobile SIMs in 2024.
- At the tip of the train, a complete of 64.3 million traces had been yanked off the networks for not being registered correctly.
- The enormous loss was considerably pushed by two of the operators, Globacom and 9mobile, which shed huge weight as a result of unverified NINs.
- Globacom, which had 62.1 million active subscriptions as of March 2024, was left with 19.1 million subscriptions on the finish of September, shedding a whopping 43 million subscriptions.
Similarly, 9mobile, which had misplaced quite a few prospects in the previous years, was left with solely 3.6 million active subscriptions on the finish of September.
- As of March 2024, 9mobile’s subscription database stood at 11.6 million, indicating that the telecom operator had misplaced about eight million subscriptions to the NIN verification train
This motion left the 4 GSM operators with a complete of 154.6 million active subscriptions on the finish of September from 219 million recorded in April 2024.
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