Kenya mobile subscribers top 31.8m

The Communications Authority of Kenya (CAK) reveals that mobile subscribers in Kenya have surpassed 31.8 million in the first quarter, marking a 1.8 percent growth rate. This pattern of growth has been consistent over the past few years, never exceeding a 2 percent increase per quarter, which is significantly different from the previous year’s 2.9 percent drop observed during the same period.

Post-paid subscriptions consistently grew, with an impressive 8.4 percent increase, raising the number to 607,569 from 560,503 recorded in the prior quarter. Mobile penetration during this timeframe rose by 1.3 percentage points to stand at 78.2 percent.

An uptick of 0.9 percent was seen in the mobile money transfer sector, bringing the figures to 26.2 million subscriptions, a minor boost from 26.0 million noted in the previous quarter. Concurrently, there was a notable increase of 10.6 percent in the number of money transfer agents, bringing their total to 103,660.

However, Mobile Number Portability trends were mixed, with in-ports experiencing an increase of 31.2 percent during this period, rising from 276 to 362 compared to the last quarter.

Despite the growth, mobile voice traffic registered a decrease of 2.7 percent, accounting for 7.6 billion minutes versus 7.8 billion in the previous quarter. In line with this, there was a shortening in average use, with subscribers now spending an average of 80.3 minutes per month compared to 84.1 minutes prior. SMS traffic also took a hit, declining by 1.0 percent, which resulted in 6.22 billion messages sent compared to 6.28 billion in the previous quarter. Consequently, the average text messages sent monthly per subscriber dropped to 65.1.

Fixed lines witnessed a minor decline of 0.7 percent, bringing the total count to 204,354, down from 205,856 lines recorded last quarter. A similar drop was noted for fixed terrestrial lines and fixed wireless subscriptions, which decreased by 1.6 and 0.4 percent respectively.

However, the internet/data market segment indicated a positive trajectory, with a 1.3 percent rise, bringing total subscriptions to 13.3 million from last quarter’s 13.1 million. Internet penetration also experienced a slight increase, rising to 53.3 percent from 52.3 percent. In sync with this, broadband subscriptions experienced a minor increase of 0.9 percent to stand at 1.44 million subscriptions, up from 1.43 million in the previous quarter.

Though modest, international internet available bandwidth growth was held at 0.4 percent during this period, up to 865,714Mbps from 862,473.9Mbps recorded last quarter. On a similar note, use of said international bandwidth saw a significant increase by 22.3 percent, jumping to 447,064 Mbps up from the previous period’s 365,413 Mbps.

Last but not least, domain name registrations made commendable strides, with a 9.1 percent increase noted, which raised the figure to 33,381, up from 30,585 last quarter.

Minor enhancements were applied in 2025 for readability.