Digital economy spikes amid subscriber recovery campaigns 

Kenya’s digital economy continued its growth trajectory in the third quarter of the 2024/25 financial year, driven by aggressive subscriber recovery campaigns and the rising demand for high-speed mobile broadband.
New data from the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) reveals that active mobile SIM subscriptions surged by 6.7 per cent to reach 76.2 million as of March 2025, translating to a penetration rate of 145.3 per cent.
The spike underscores the intensity of customer win-back campaigns by telcos, especially in a competitive market where brand loyalty is increasingly fragile.
Safaricom remained the dominant player in the SIM card market, commanding 48.2 million active subscriptions.
Airtel followed with 24.5 million, maintaining its strong second-place showing amid sustained network investments and aggressive pricing strategies.
Equitel, the mobile virtual network operator backed by Equity Bank under Finserve, came in third with 1.5 million subscriptions, highlighting the growing traction of fintech-integrated mobile offerings even if at a smaller scale.
The rest of the market is shared among Telkom Kenya and Jamii Telecom, whose numbers remain marginal by comparison.
“This growth is attributed to the various customer win-back campaigns run by the operators during the reference period,” the CA sector study notes.
The surge in SIM subscriptions had a knock-on effect on mobile money usage. Subscriptions to mobile financial services climbed 7.3 per cent to 45.4 million, pushing penetration to 86.6 per cent.
The correlation between SIM and mobile money growth speaks to the deeply entrenched role of mobile wallets in Kenya’s daily transactions, especially as consumers increasingly rely on digital payments in the face of tighter household budgets and ongoing fiscal reforms.
Mobile internet usage
The CA data also points to modest growth in mobile internet usage. Mobile data subscriptions edged up 1.9 per cent to 57.2 million, from 56.1 million in the preceding quarter.
The marginal increase masks a deeper shift underway: the growing appetite for faster connectivity is accelerating the uptake of 4G and 5G networks.
“The growing demand for faster internet speeds has served as a key driver for the increased uptake of 4G and 5G mobile services,” the CA report notes.
Operators have been racing to expand coverage in urban and peri-urban centres, hoping to capture the next frontier of mobile-led services, including e-commerce, streaming, and remote work platforms.
Despite the rise in subscriptions, overall mobile broadband usage nudged upward by only 1.4 per cent to 576,458.8 terabytes.
Notably, the average broadband consumption per user slipped slightly, from 13.1 gigabytes to 13.0 gigabytes.
This dip may reflect cautious consumer spending on data amid broader economic headwinds, including persistent inflation and limited wage growth.
Smartphone penetration remains critical to Kenya’s digital future, and the report shows that out of 74.9 million mobile phones connected to mobile networks, 42.3 million were smartphones.
That puts smartphone penetration at 80.8 per cent, compared to 62.2 per cent for feature phones.
Economic activities
The dominance of smartphones not only enables broader access to financial and digital services but also lays the foundation for AI-driven solutions and app-based economic activities to take root.
Safaricom not only led in SIM subscriptions but also retained a commanding 90.8 per cent of mobile money subscriptions and 62.9 per cent of mobile broadband users.
Airtel, which has steadily clawed back market share in recent years, held 9.1 per cent of mobile money and 32.7 per cent of mobile broadband subscriptions.  Finserve, though smaller in absolute numbers, remains a notable challenger, holding 2 per cent of SIMs and 1.2 per cent of broadband.
Jamii trails at under 1 per cent across most indicators but continues to serve niche data users.
The data paints a picture of a market still expanding in absolute terms, but also beginning to plateau in per-user growth.
With penetration rates now exceeding 140 per cent, the next phase of competition will likely hinge on value-added services, device financing models, and cost-effective data bundles.
In that race, operators will need to innovate not just on infrastructure, but on how they personalise and deliver services to an increasingly savvy and value-conscious customer base.