Africa is the second largest continent after Asia, both in size and in population; It lies south of Europe and is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the Indian Ocean to the east, covering approximately 30.2 million km² (11.7 million sq mi) including adjacent islands, making up % of the total land area. With 1.0 billion people (as of 2009, see table), Africa accounts for about 14.72% of the world’s population. In this article we cover the internet usage and statistics of the continent – Africa. Hope you find them informative.
Internet Usage and Statistics in Africa: What You Need to Know
Although it is an established fact that the internet use in Africa is still limited by a lower penetration rate compared to Europe and the United States, as most internet activity and infrastructure is concentrated in countries like South Africa, Morocco, Egypt and smaller economies like Mauritius and Seychelles focus. Africa is also one of the fastest growing countries in the world in terms of connectivity and usage, especially in terms of mobile telephony, which is more widespread than landline phones. The opportunity lies in broadband wireless access technologies rather than the key to bringing the Internet to the masses. Several telecom companies in Africa see this option as a more viable alternative.
All the details related to the internet in Africa which include but are not limited to network traffic, available bandwidth and cost of bandwidth, internet service provider subscriptions, as well as host number. This shows that South Africa is not only the leader here, but also the only African country whose numbers are closely related to what you will find in Europe and North America; closely followed by countries like the seychelles and mauritius. a number of north african countries are also on the agenda, including morocco and egypt. next to south africa, kenya is the leading sub-saharan country for telecommunications and internet development.
While internet penetration is still low, several sources report that “the data on internet subscribers only partially reflects the actual number of internet users in Africa and the impact of the network on African daily life and culture”. A number of Internet users do not have broadband Internet services in their homes, but a higher percentage of Africans rely on cyber cafes and similar establishments. An even larger percentage prefer to access the internet via mobile devices. Up to 50% of Nigerians access the web via mobile devices for example.
Top 10 countries in Africa based on internet usage
Read more: The best tech startups in Africa, according to Forbes
Key Facts About Notable Internet Use in Africa
- 1,037,524,058 are population estimates for Africa2012, of which there are 167,335,676 internet users in Africa as of June 30, 2012, a penetration rate of 15.6%%, a significant increase from the 2011 data, where this figure was around 13 % + lag
- Nigeria still has the highest number of users with 48,366,179, followed by Egypt with 29,809,724, Morocco with 16 million, Kenya with 12 million and South Africa with 8.5 million
- The largest percentage of internet subscribers are found in small economies like the Seychelles, where 37% of the population has internet access (in South Africa it is 11% and in Egypt 8%).
- Cell phone, cell phone! cell phone, cell phone!! Cell phone, cell phone!!! Africans appreciate cell phones. There are more than 650 million cell phone subscribers on the continent, more than the US or the European Union.
See also: Top 10 venture capitalists in Africa
The new 2018 Global Digital series of reports from We Are Social and Hootsuite reveals that 4 billion people around the world are now using the internet.
Well over half of the world’s population online now. The latest data shows that in 2017, nearly a quarter billion new internet users came online for the first time.
Africa has not been let down by growth, which has recorded the fastest growth rates: the number of internet users across the continent increased significantly by more than 20% year-on-year.
Much of the increase in internet users in 2018 can be attributed to cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans.
You can use this link to view the latest statistics on Internet usage and Facebook usage by country.