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Nigerians spend trillions to stay connected as data consumption soars
By Chinenye Anuforo
For many Nigerians, the day no longer begins with a cup of tea, breakfast or the morning newspaper. It begins with a check of the phone.
WhatsApp messages are opened. Emails are checked. Social media notifications are reviewed. A video is streamed. A bank transfer is made. A business owner responds to customers. A student searches for learning materials. A worker joins a virtual meeting. Someone else opens an artificial intelligence application to write, research, analyse or create. All of these activities have one thing in common, data.
What was once considered an optional expense has quietly become an essential part of everyday life for millions of Nigerians. The numbers coming from telecommunications industry are beginning to tell that story.
One of the leading telecommunication companies in Nigeria generated a staggering N1.699 trillion from data services in the first six months of 2026, representing a 38.3 per cent increase from the N1.229 trillion recorded in the corresponding period of 2025.
The figure is contained in the telecommunications company’s financial statements for the six months ended June 30, 2026.
Importantly, the N1.699 trillion is company’s data revenue, not the total amount spent on data by Nigerians across all telecommunications operators. The company’s definition of data revenue covers mobile data, fixed broadband and data bundles but excludes roaming data, which is recorded under interconnect and roaming revenue.
Yet, even with that qualification, the figure provides a revealing window into how deeply internet connectivity has become embedded in Nigerian life. The money Nigerians are putting into connectivity is only one side of the story. The volume of data being consumed is perhaps even more revealing.
The company recorded 5,351.27 petabytes of network traffic during the first six months of the year. Its wireless subscriber base stood at 85.3 million on a 30-day basis and 92.2 million on a 90-day basis, while broadband subscribers reached almost 2 million on a 90-day basis.
Put differently, company’s network alone was carrying an enormous volume of digital activity every month. And the company’s figures are only part of the national picture.
Data from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) showed that Nigerians consumed 4.06 million terabytes of data in the first quarter of 2026. January recorded 1.39 million TB, February 1.26 million TB and March 1.42 million TB.
March was particularly striking. According to figures attributed to the NCC, Nigerians consumed about 45,800 terabytes of data every day in March. The NCC’s illustration was that this was roughly equivalent to watching more than 15 million hours of high-definition video every day.
NCC Executive Vice Chairman, Aminu Maida, said the rapid growth in data consumption reflected the increasing adoption of digital payments, e-commerce, technology startups, digital literacy and emerging technologies, underscoring the potential of Nigeria’s digital economy to drive innovation and expand opportunities. This is no longer simply a telecommunications story. It is a story about how Nigerians now live, work, trade, learn and entertain themselves.
The nature of internet consumption is also changing. According to technology expert, Jide Awe of Jidaw System Limited, a decade ago, much of the demand for mobile data centred on messaging, social networking and basic web browsing.
Today, he explained, the smartphone has become a workplace, classroom, bank, marketplace, entertainment centre and increasingly an AI assistant.
“A trader can photograph a product and advertise it instantly to hundreds of potential customers. A fashion designer can receive measurements and orders through WhatsApp. A journalist can conduct interviews virtually, research documents online and transmit stories from almost anywhere. A Nigerian working for a company abroad can attend meetings and deliver assignments without leaving the country. Every one of these activities requires connectivity,” he explained.
This helps explain why data consumption has continued to rise even as Nigerians face pressure on household incomes. The growth in data spending is taking place against a difficult economic background.
In January 2025, the NCC approved a 50 per cent adjustment in telecommunications tariffs after operators complained of rising operating costs, inflation, foreign exchange pressures and the cost of maintaining infrastructure.
The adjustment pushed the floor price for 1GB of data to N431.25 from N287.50. For consumers, the increase meant that staying connected became more expensive at precisely the time when dependence on connectivity was increasing.
For operators, however, the argument was that higher tariffs were necessary to sustain investment in networks whose operating costs had risen sharply.
That tension remains at the heart of telecoms industry, consumers want affordable and reliable connectivity, while operators need sufficient revenue to maintain and expand infrastructure.
MTN Nigeria Chief Executive Officer, Karl Toriola, has defended the cost of data in Nigeria, arguing that consumers should compare local prices with those in other countries.
“Tell me if data in Nigeria is not among the four cheapest in the world,” he said, urging Nigerians to compare local data prices with those in other countries.
Toriola also explained that what consumers perceive as rapid depletion of their data bundles could sometimes be linked to the growing number of applications and services running on their devices.
He pointed to background applications, automatic updates, cloud synchronisation, video streaming and other activities that can consume large amounts of data without users immediately noticing. He cited the example of an MTN employee whose WhatsApp backup alone consumed 156GB of data, illustrating how significant data usage can occur in the background.
Awe argued that ordinarily, when the price of a product rises sharply, consumers reduce their consumption. “But data is proving different. The continued growth suggests that many Nigerians cannot simply switch off their internet connections.”
“For some, data means access to income. For others, it means access to customers. For students, it can mean access to education. For remote workers, it can mean access to employment. For families, it provides communication with relatives and friends. For millions of people, it is also the gateway to banking, government services, entertainment and information.”
This explained why data increasingly behaves less like a luxury and more like a household utility.
The NCC’s figures reinforced the point. Internet subscriptions reached 151.6 million in January 2026, up from 141.7 million a year earlier, while monthly data consumption jumped from about 1.001 million TB in January 2025 to 1.386 million TB in January 2026. The country is therefore not only connecting more people, those already connected are consuming substantially more data.
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The changing nature of data consumption was also reflected in the technology Nigerians are using. NCC data reported in March showed that 4G accounted for more than half of mobile technology usage, while 5G adoption continued to grow.
On a company’s network, 5G population coverage increased from 12 per cent in 2025 to 13.1 per cent in H1 2026. The company has set a target of exceeding 40 per cent coverage by 2030. Broadband penetration stood at 91 per cent within the company’s reported metric.
The implication is significant. As faster networks become available, consumers are able to do more than simply send text messages. Higher speeds make video, cloud applications, online gaming, video conferencing and AI applications more practical.
And as those services become more popular, they generate even more demand for data. It is a cycle that is likely to continue.
The transformation is particularly visible in the company’s Nigeria’s financial performance. While voice revenue remained substantial at N897.14 billion in the first half of 2026, data revenue was almost twice as large at N1.699 trillion. Data therefore accounted for more than half of the company’s total revenue of N2.993 trillion during the period.
Digital revenue, which covers the distribution of video, music, gaming and lifestyle content as well as e-commerce activities, added another N58.66 billion. Other revenue also includes cloud and infrastructure services and ICT revenue.
The second quarter alone generated N873.83 billion in data revenue, compared with N699.95 billion in the same quarter of 2025.
The strength of the data business helped the company record total revenue of almost N3 trillion in six months. Profit after tax rose by 70.6 per cent to N707.54 billion, from N414.86 billion in the first half of 2025, while profit before tax rose by 75.4 per cent to N1.09 trillion. The company’s earnings per share also rose from N19.80 to N33.76.
There is another side to the impressive revenue numbers, the cost of keeping the network running. The company’s H1 report showed that telecommunications infrastructure requires enormous investment in equipment, energy, software, network security and resilience.
The company disclosed N6.8 billion in capital expenditure associated with initiatives including solar deployment at base stations, electric vehicle charging infrastructure, high-efficiency cooling equipment and IT and network security infrastructure. It also capitalised N9.5 billion in IT and network security software costs.
The company reported N5.6 billion in diesel cost savings from energy-efficiency and energy-transition initiatives during the period. It also deployed renewable energy across 15 locations and transitioned eight locations to compressed natural gas-powered independent power or energy-as-a-service supply.
These investments help explained why operators have continued to push for a more sustainable pricing environment.
The industry is effectively trying to build and power the infrastructure required by a country whose appetite for connectivity is growing rapidly.
As data becomes indispensable, the quality of the connection becomes just as important as its price.
A consumer who buys data but cannot use it effectively is effectively paying twice, once for the bundle and again through lost time, missed business opportunities and interrupted services.
The company reported network availability of 98.9 per cent in H1 2026. It also disclosed seven Severity 1 and 2 IT and network service disruptions in the second quarter, with total customer downtime from such incidents put at 16 hours and eight minutes.
The broader industry has faced similar concerns as one year after the 50 per cent telecom tariff adjustment, consumers continued to complain about service quality even as operators’ revenues improved.
The NCC has also continued to emphasise the need for greater investment in telecommunications infrastructure as data consumption rises.
Awe stated that if data has become an essential service, Nigerians increasingly expect it to be available, affordable and reliable.
“The significance of the trend extends beyond telecommunications companies.
The telecommunications sector has become a major contributor to the wider economy. Recent analysis of NBS and NCC data showed that telecommunications and information services accounted for 9.19 per cent of Nigeria’s real GDP in Q1 2026, contributing about N4.71 trillion to real GDP. This is important because every additional megabyte consumed is potentially supporting another economic activity. A payment made through a mobile application. An online order. A digital advertisement. A remote job amongst others.”
“The digital economy is therefore being built not only in technology companies and data centres, but also in the everyday data consumption of ordinary Nigerians”, the Jidaw System boss pointed out.
The company’s numbers suggested that the appetite is nowhere near saturation. Active MoMo wallets on the network increased from 3.8 million to five million, while 5G population coverage increased to 13.1 per cent.
As financial technology, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, streaming, cloud computing and digital work expand, demand for reliable connectivity is likely to rise further.
The implication for Nigeria is both an opportunity and a warning.
The opportunity is economic, more connectivity can mean more digital businesses, more remote employment, greater financial inclusion, wider access to education and faster adoption of new technologies.
The warning is affordability. A digital economy cannot fully thrive if a significant proportion of the population is connected but cannot afford to use the connection meaningfully.
The challenge, therefore, is no longer simply getting Nigerians online. It is keeping them online.
The N1.699 trillion recorded by a leading telecommunication company is ultimately more than a financial statistic.
It captures a fundamental change in Nigerian society.
The internet has moved from being something people occasionally used to something they increasingly need.
And for the country as a whole, it is becoming one of the foundations of economic activity.
The extraordinary volume of traffic recorded by the company and the wider industry suggests that the nation’s digital transformation is no longer a promise for the future. It is happening now, one data bundle at a time.
The question confronting policymakers, telecom operators and consumers is therefore no longer whether Nigerians will continue to consume data. They clearly will.
The bigger question is whether Nigeria can make that connectivity affordable, reliable, fast and widely available enough to turn the country’s growing appetite for data into sustained economic opportunity.
