Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) on Thursday said Nigerians consumed more than 1.42 million terabytes of data in March 2026, reflecting a rapid expansion of the country’s digital economy and growing internet adoption.
NCC
The Executive Vice-Chairman of the NCC, Aminu Maida, who was represented by the Executive Commissioner for Stakeholder Management, Rimini Makama, gave the figure at the 2026 Workshop for Judges on Legal Issues in Telecommunications in Lagos.
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Maida said the March 2026 total was a marked increase from the 995,000 terabytes recorded in March 2025, and amounts to about 45,800 terabytes of data daily. “Put another way, this is roughly equivalent to Nigerians watching over 15 million hours of high-definition video every single day,” he said.
He noted that in March 2025 average daily consumption stood at about 32,100 terabytes, or roughly 10.7 million hours of HD video, adding that Nigerians are now using the equivalent of about 4.6 million more hours of HD video every day than a year earlier.
Maida attributed the surge to wider adoption of digital payments, e-commerce platforms, online learning, streaming entertainment, remote work and other internet-enabled services, as well as improvements in broadband penetration from 47.7 per cent in 2025 to 54.3 per cent in 2026.
He said telecommunications operators invested over $1 billion in network expansion in 2025, deploying thousands of additional sites nationwide to improve coverage and service quality.
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Maida said the figures underscored the critical role of the telecommunications sector in driving economic growth, innovation and social inclusion, but warned that increased reliance on digital infrastructure brings rising challenges including cybercrime, online fraud, infrastructure vandalism and threats to online safety.
He called for stronger collaboration among regulators, the judiciary, security agencies and industry players to protect telecommunications infrastructure and sustain the country’s digital transformation agenda.
