South Africa has one of the most dynamic and competitive mobile telecommunications markets on the African continent. With millions of subscribers and evolving infrastructure, the country's mobile operators play a crucial role in driving connectivity, digital inclusion and economic growth.
Data from GSMA Intelligence shows that there were 124 million cellular mobile connections in South Africa at the beginning of 2025. For perspective, many individuals make use of more than one mobile connection, so it is not unusual for mobile connection figures to significantly exceed the total population. For example, the same person might have one connection for personal use and another for work. The rise of eSIMs has made this even easier in recent years.
GSMA Intelligence’s numbers indicate that mobile connections in South Africa were equivalent to 193 percent of the total population in January 2025. Looking at trends over time, the number of mobile connections increased by 5.2 million (4.4 percent) between the start of 2024 and the beginning of 2025.
Meanwhile, GSMA Intelligence data suggests that 97.5 percent of mobile connections in South Africa can now be considered broadband, which means they connect via 3G, 4G or 5G networks.
However, devices connected to broadband mobile networks do not necessarily use mobile data. For instance, some subscription plans may only include access to voice and SMS services. Therefore, this broadband figure should not be considered a proxy for mobile internet usage.
South Africa's main mobile operators are Vodacom and MTN, the dominant players, with Vodacom holding the largest share, followed by MTN, Telkom and Cell C.
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In Opensignal’s latest analysis of the mobile network landscape in South Africa, MTN leads in seven out of 13 metrics, including Download Speed Experience, 5G Availability, and 5G Video and Games Experience. Vodacom achieves top scores in Consistent Quality, 5G Download Speed, 5G Upload Speed, Coverage and 5G Coverage Experience, followed by Cell C and Telkom.
Vodacom South Africa, the country’s largest operator, reported 50.7 million mobile subscribers at the end of December 2024. It has introduced a cloud-based phone to reduce the cost of smartphone access and to accelerate the migration of customers from legacy networks to modern 4G services on what it describes as the country’s most reliable network.
The device, manufactured by South African firm Mobicel, is intended to lower the barrier to smartphone use and to encourage users to move from 2G or 3G to 4G. The Mobicel S4 4G Cloud Phone is a thin-client device with 48MB RAM, 128MB ROM, a 2.8-inch screen and a 1000mAh battery. It relies on the cloud to run applications typically associated with more powerful smartphones, such as YouTube, TikTok and Facebook. Vodacom describes this as a 'smartphone lite' experience. The device is not exclusive to Vodacom and is priced at R249, or approximately US$13.93.
Vodacom was the first operator in South Africa to launch mobile 5G services in May 2020, starting with selected areas in Johannesburg, Pretoria and Cape Town. This early deployment was enabled by temporary emergency spectrum allocated during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Initial performance across the first five 5G clusters in Gauteng showed average download speeds of 154 Mbps, upload speeds of 14 Mbps and latency of around 31 ms, a strong starting point for next-generation connectivity.
Today, Vodacom’s 5G network covers over 50 percent of the South African population, with continued expansion. The company is investing approximately R10 billion annually into its network, focusing on optimising existing infrastructure, deploying new spectrum for improved coverage and capacity, and building new sites to extend its national footprint.
Vodacom has also announced increased investment in the Free State and Northern Cape provinces to enhance network speed and signal quality, particularly in rural areas.
MTN's official quarterly update for the end of September 2024 put its total users in South Africa at 39.2 million.
MTN South Africa launched its commercial 5G network on June 30, 2020, activating 100 sites across major cities including Johannesburg, Cape Town, Bloemfontein, and Port Elizabeth.
More recently MTN, in partnership with Huawei, successfully completed South Africa’s first 5.5G network trial at MTN’s head office in Johannesburg.
The trial featured Huawei’s SingleRAN ultra-wideband active-antenna units, combining hybrid beam-forming technology with flexible dynamic beam management and inter-FR carrier aggregation to push network performance to the next level. Using spectrum in both the millimetre wave and C-band, made available through a trial license, the test ran on a 5G standalone (SA) setup. MTN reported a peak download speed of 8.6Gbps during the trial, showcasing the future potential of next-gen connectivity.
5.5G, often viewed as a stepping stone between 5G and 6G, promises 10 times the performance of current 5G networks. This includes dramatic improvements in speed, latency, and massive IoT capacity, all while reducing energy consumption per terabyte of data transferred.
In the latest Open Signal Report MTN wins the 5G Availability award, with the 5G users on its network connecting to 5G on average for 11.5% of the time. Having superfast 5G download speeds are only useful when users have a 5G connection. 5G Availability compares the amount of time the 5G users spend with an active 5G connection, the higher the percentage, the more time users on a network spend connected to 5G.
Telkom South Africa is seeing significant growth in its mobile subscribers, and is edging closer to the country's two biggest operators, Vodacom and MTN.
Telkom has also announced plans to sell its tower infrastructure, joining rivals MTN South Africa and Cell C in this strategic shift to focus on core business operations. With this move, Vodacom will be the only major mobile operator in South Africa that continues to own its tower infrastructure. This trend reflects a broader industry focus on streamlining business operations by offloading non-core assets.
These plans reflects the company's enhanced operational efficiency and successful monetization of its digital infrastructure asset base. according to Serame Taukobong, Group Chief Executive Officer:
“Our continued investment in our extensive fiber network and mobile infrastructure is now delivering the competitive advantage we anticipated, propelling our data-led strategy to ensure future-readiness,”
The operator's infrastructure investments continue to deliver significant operational results. Mobile subscribers grew by 24.6% year-on-year, surpassing 22.7 million, while mobile data subscribers increased by 19.6% to 14.6 million, driving a 12.7% rise in data revenues. Openserve’s fiber infrastructure also showed strong performance, with homes passed and connected growing by 11.4% and 18.1%, respectively, maintaining a market-leading home connection rate of 49.7%. Additionally, IT revenues sustained steady growth, highlighting the effectiveness of the company's connect-led strategy.
The smallest of the South Africa operators Cell C has been trying to increase their market share, but only had 7.7 million mobile subscribers at the end of May 2024.
According to the latest Open Signal Report Cell C users have seen the biggest increases across Overall Experience metrics compared to the last report. The quality of experience streaming on-demand video on Cell C has improved by 25%, while the average download and upload speeds have grown by 30% and 53%, respectively. These improvements are particularly significant given that Cell C has not been investing in its own network infrastructure due to severe financial difficulties in recent years. These challenges led to the company's recapitalization and the establishment of new wholesale and roaming agreements with MTN and Vodacom.
As part of this transition, Cell C deactivated its physical tower network and Radio Access Network (RAN). MTN now provides Cell C with a virtual radio access network for its prepaid and mobile virtual network operator subscribers, while Cell C’s contract customers roam on Vodacom’s network. However, Cell C continues to use its own spectrum and retains full control over the customer experience. Additionally, Cell C is currently testing 5G with network partners Vodacom and MTN, with plans to launch it soon.
Cell C has spent the past 18 months deploying a Mocn – multi-operator network core – roaming system, which has allowed it to create a virtual representation of its network on top of either MTN or Vodacom’s infrastructure.
We can clearly see with the ongoing investments from major operators, a great deal of progress is being made and 5G has the potential to bridge the digital divide, drive economic growth, and position South Africa as a leader in next-generation connectivity on the African continent.
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