As per the latest data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel gained 4.17 million and 0.75 million mobile users respectively in January 2024, largely at the expense of Vodafone Idea Limited (Vi), which continued to suffer big subscriber losses. Vi lost a whopping 1.52 million mobile users during the period, further shrinking its user base to 221.52 million.
Separately, Jio further consolidated its market leadership in the wireline space in January 2024. TRAI data showed that Jio added 0.24 million wireline users, boosting its landline user base to 11.29 million. Meanwhile, market leader Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) gained 0.36 million wireline users. In addition, Airtel added 0.10 million users, boosting its wireline user base to around 8.41 million.
Further, the month of January 2024 witnessed Jio widening its customer market share to 39.97 per cent (from 39.69 per cent in December 2023), while Airtel’s market share remained unchanged at 32.95 per cent. In addition, Vi’s narrowed further to 19.09 per cent as against 19.25 per cent the previous month.
Besides, TRAI data showed that Vi lost customers in rural India, while Airtel and Jio made modest gains. Vi lost 0.63 million in these geographies while Airtel gained 0.85 million and Jio added around 1.88 million. The data released by the regulator also showed that overall wireless tele-density increased marginally to 83.05 per cent in January 2024 from 82.95 per cent in December 2023.
During January 2024, 12.36 million users submitted requests for mobile number portability (MNP), increasing the cumulative requests to 939.55 million by end-January 2024 from 927.19 million by end-December 2023. The wireline user base increased from 31.84 million at the end of December 2023 to 32.54 million at the end of January 2024, registering a net increase of 0.70 million.
