The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), in its current report, has said that Nigeria telecommunication providers increased their internet subscriber base by 7.88 million in the third quarter of 2020.
According to NBS, the total number of internet subscribers increased by 7.87 million (5.48 percent) in Q3 2020 from 143.6 million recorded in the previous quarter to 151.5 million subscribers.
Also, it increased by 28.3 million (23 percent) as against 123 million recorded in the corresponding period of 2019 (Q3 2019).
Analysis of the report shows that as of Q3 2020, MTN held the highest internet market share with 42 percent. The total number of active internet subscribers for MTN was 64.35 million.
Airtel followed with a market share of 27 percent (40.31 million), Globacom followed closely with a market share of 26 percent (39.13 million), while 9mobile recorded a market share of 5 percent (7.3 million).
The four major networks recorded positive growths in the number of active internet subscribers when compared to Q2 2020.
However, 9mobile lost some internet subscribers when compared to Q3 2019, specifically, 9mobile lost 1.19 million internet subscribers between Q3 2019 and Q3 2020.
In terms of voice subscriptions, telcos in Nigeria increased their customer base by over 9 million in Q3 2020 compared to the previous quarter, while 26.1 million additional subscribers joined year-on-year.
However, MTN Nigeria controls a market share of 40 percent as of Q3 2020, followed by Airtel with 26.9 percent, Glo (26.4 percent), 9mobile (6.2 percent), and others with a market share of 0.2percent.
Airtel grew its customer base by 5.3 percent, followed by 9mobile, which increased by 5.1 percent in the same period.