Mobile user base dips by nearly 10 million as tariff hike pinches

Mobile subscriber base dipped by nearly 10 million users in January as tariff hikes make services dearer, according to the latest release of subscriber data by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). Except Mumbai, Jammu & Kashmir and Maharashtra service areas, all other service areas have showed decline in their wireless subscribers.

Jio loses users in Jan too

While the tariff hike was announced by all three large operators including Airtel and Vodafone Idea, Reliance Jio lost 9.3 million subscribers in January. 

The operators had increased tariffs in November 2021 by 25 per cent and since then they have been losing subscribers. Urban subscribers account for nearly 66 per cent of the total subscriber loss. This is the second consecutive month of subscriber degrowth. Operators had lost 1.28 crore subscribers in December 2021.

January 2022 is the second month, where Jio has posted subscriber loss. Conversely, Bharti Airtel added 7.14 lakh subscribers to their overall wireless base. Vodafone Idea’s subscriber base continued to dip losing 3.8 lakh subscribers in January.  Experts said that the dip in Jio’s user base could also be due to weeding out of inactive users from the network.

Bharti Airtel’s market share has moved up to 26.90 per cent (from 26.52 in the previous month), Reliance Jio is at 52.49 per cent (previously 53.06 per cent), Vodafone Idea has 15.45 per cent market share (previously 15.48 per cent). 

Number of active wireless subscribers (on the date of peak Visitor location register-VLR#) in December, 2021 was 1000.63 million

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