By Mark Kawalya
Uganda registered an increase of two hundred and thirty-two thousand (232,000), internet broadband subscriptions for the period of April–June 2022. According to the Uganda Communications Commission’s (UCC) market performance report, this brought the cumulative total of broadband connections in Uganda to 23.7 million.
Comparatively, in a year-on-year analysis, the 12 months that ended in June 2022 recorded a total of 1.9 million new broadband subscriptions. The quarterly reports translated this to an 8% year-on-year increase in internet broadband subscriptions.
With 23.7 million broadband users, Uganda’s internet penetration stood at 55 internet connections for every 100 Ugandans.
“The 232,000 new broadband connections are 34% of total new telephone connections. The growth in new broadband connections may be attributed to new smartphone promotional device activity during the quarter,” the UCC report states.
In comparison, fixed and mobile subscriptions increased by 690,000 users during the same period. This resulted in a total number of subscriptions of 31.3 million for the period ending June 2022.
The report further shows that in 12 months (June 2021-June 2022) new telephone subscriptions of 2.4 million were registered, indicating an 8% annual growth. This converts into a penetration rate of 73 lines for every 100 Ugandans.
In terms of broadband traffic, Uganda registered an internet traffic of 110 billion MBs that was recorded for the quarter. This was the highest internet traffic volume ever recorded in a quarter for the country.
This was a 17% increase from the 93.6 billion MBs recorded in the country’s first quarter period ending March 2022.”This growth is largely indicative of increased broadband usage rather than an increase in broadband subscriptions. In percentage terms, the growth in internet traffic is 17 times the growth in broadband subscriptions realized during the quarter,” the report states. The report indicates that the growth in internet use is driven by data-led consumption, which has received higher demand than traditional voice traffic, coupled with the growth in streaming services.
