Reliance Jio added the maximum subscribers in August this year followed by Bharati Airtel whereas Vodafone-Idea lost about 8.33 lakh subscribers, reveals Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI)'s latest subscription data released on Wednesday.
Total telephone subscribers in the country increased to 1,209.58 million subscribers, 0.01 per cent growth compared to July this year. Total urban telephone subscribers rose to 671.31 million, a 0.14 per cent increase from July. However, total rural telephone subscribers decreased by 0.08 per cent to 538.28 million for the same time period.
Overall telephone density fell to 88.45 per cent in August this year compared to 88.51 per cent in July.
TRAI added that excluding Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Rajasthan, Kolkata, Uttar Pradesh East, Delhi, Maharashtra, Odisha and Gujarat, all service areas witnessed growth in their wireless subscribers in August. Punjab led the table with a growth of 0.50 per cent in August compared to the previous month.
Reliance Jio most subscribed, Airtel second
Jio added the maximum subscribers in August, followed by Bharati Airtel whereas Vodafone-Idea and state-operated BSNL lost customers.
The Mukesh Ambani-owned telecom operator added approximate 6.5 lakh subscribers in August. It now caters to a total of approx 44.4 crore subscribers.
Bharati Airtel added 1.38 lakh subscribers in August, which bought its cumulative tally to 35.4 crore subscribers.
Vodafone-Idea continued to lose subscribers. They lost about 8.33 lakh subscribers in August. Implying, they now have approx 27.1 lakh subscribers.
Wireless Broadband
TRAI added that Reliance Jio held the maximum subscribers in the wireless broadband category followed by Bharati Airtel, Vodafone-Idea, BSNL and Tikona Infinet.
Jio had 443.86 million customers as of August 31 this year. Bharati Airtel held 202.27 million customers, Vodafone-Idea 123.53 million customers, BSNL 18.19 million and Tikona Infinet 0.30 million.
Market share
TRAI added that in terms of market share, Jio led the race holding 37.4 per cent of the market share. Airtel stood second with 29.85 per cent, Vodafone-Idea held 22.89 per cent whereas state-operated BSNL commanded a 9.63 per cent market share.
The regulator added that 11.28 million customers had applied for mobile number portability in August. It was 10.99 million in July.
According to data revealed on Tuesday, Reliance Jio stood first in TRAI's 4G speed comparison chart with an average download speed of 20.9 megabytes per second (MBPS) in September. Vodafone-Idea secured first place in terms of upload speed by maintaining an average speed of 7.3 MBPS.
Jio's speed increased 15 per cent in September, Airtel spiked 85 per cent whereas Vodafone-Idea's average speed spiked by 60 per cent in September.
