MTN leads Nigeria’s mobile internet performance

January 16, 2026

MTN leads Nigeria’s mobile internet performance

Nigeria’s mobile internet market sits at the core of the country’s digital economy, underpinning everything from financial services and media consumption to remote work and small business operations.

As data usage continues to rise during peak evening hours, network quality, rather than subscriber numbers alone, has become a defining competitive variable.

Against this backdrop, independent performance benchmarks offer a clearer view of how Nigeria’s major mobile network operators are meeting the demands placed on their infrastructure.

A 2025 analytical report by nPerf, a France-based mobile internet testing platform, positions MTN Nigeria as the country’s strongest performer in mobile internet quality.

The findings, published in the Barometer of Mobile Internet Connections in Nigeria, assess user experience across the full year using real-world speed test data generated by Nigerian subscribers on the nPerf platform.

Market performance, measured through user experience

The report assigns performance scores, referred to as nPoints, based on multiple indicators including download speed, upload speed, latency, browsing, and streaming performance.

MTN Nigeria leads the ranking with 37,106 nPoints, significantly ahead of Airtel Nigeria, which placed second with 25,614 nPoints. Globacom followed in third position with 20,475 nPoints.

nPerf’s methodology emphasises lived network conditions rather than laboratory testing.

Data was collected throughout 2025, with particular attention to both busy hours (6pm to 11pm) and idle periods during the rest of the day. The distribution of tests also reflects market share of usage on the platform, with MTN accounting for 58% of recorded tests, Airtel 24%, and Globacom 18%.

MTN’s consistent lead across core indicators

Across nearly all measured categories, MTN Nigeria recorded the strongest results. In average download speed, MTN achieved 18.65 Mb/s over the year, compared with Airtel’s 10.57 Mb/s and Globacom’s 7.46 Mb/s.

Performance remained relatively stable during peak demand periods, with MTN delivering 15.37 Mb/s during busy hours and 19.99 Mb/s during idle times.

This consistency suggests a network better equipped to handle congestion, particularly for data-intensive activities such as HD video streaming and large file downloads.

Upload speeds followed a similar pattern. MTN recorded an average upload speed of 8.70 Mb/s in 2025, well ahead of Airtel’s 4.74 Mb/s and Globacom’s 3.85 Mb/s. During peak hours, MTN maintained an upload speed of 7.43 Mb/s, rising to 9.12 Mb/s during off-peak periods.

Latency, a key determinant of how responsive a connection feels, also favoured MTN. The operator recorded an average latency of 96.46 milliseconds.

Globacom ranked second in this category with 121.81 ms, while Airtel recorded the highest latency at 141.12 ms. Lower latency is particularly relevant for real-time applications such as video calls, online gaming, and certain fintech services.

Browsing and streaming performance

In browsing performance, MTN again led with a score of 35.78%. Globacom followed with 29.86%, narrowly ahead of Airtel at 29.45%.

Streaming performance showed a clearer separation:

MTN achieved 67.02%
Airtel placed second with 62.50%
Globacom recorded 52.44%.

Taken together, these indicators position MTN as the most reliable option for high-bandwidth use cases, while Globacom’s relative strength appears more pronounced in basic browsing scenarios.

Airtel, meanwhile, presents a middle-ground option for streaming, though its higher latency affects responsiveness.

What this signals for Nigeria’s telecom market

The performance gap highlighted by the nPerf report points to structural differences in network investment, spectrum utilisation, and capacity management.

MTN’s lead suggests sustained capital expenditure and operational focus on network quality, particularly during peak usage periods when consumer experience is most strained.

For Nigeria’s broader digital economy, uneven network performance has implications beyond consumer choice. Startups, content platforms, and digital service providers often design products assuming baseline connectivity standards.

Persistent disparities in speed and latency can reinforce digital inequality across regions and user segments, even within urban centres.

The findings also sit within a wider regional context. MTN’s recent agreement with Airtel to share network infrastructure in Nigeria and Uganda reflects growing recognition among operators that collaboration may be necessary to manage costs and improve coverage.

Whether such arrangements translate into measurable improvements for end users remains an open question.

Constraints and unanswered questions

While the report provides a useful snapshot of user experience, it is not without limitations.

The data is drawn from users who actively conduct speed tests on the nPerf platform, which may skew towards more data-aware or urban subscribers.

Rural performance, indoor coverage, and service reliability during network outages are not fully captured by speed and latency metrics alone.

In addition, high performance in 2025 does not automatically guarantee resilience in subsequent years, particularly as data consumption continues to grow and new services place additional strain on networks.

What to watch going forward

As Nigeria’s telecom operators navigate rising demand, regulatory pressures, and capital constraints, network quality will remain a critical differentiator.

Future performance reports will be worth tracking alongside indicators such as infrastructure sharing outcomes, 5G deployment progress, and investment levels.

The central question is whether improvements in headline performance translate into more consistent, accessible connectivity across the country’s diverse markets.

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