5G as a service has become pretty common in India now. The 5G BTS (Base Transceiver Station) count in India, at the end of September 2025 reached 504,588. This data was published by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) on its official website. At the end of August 2025, this figure was 498,135. This is a major milestone for the country. Right around 3 years back, India started on its 5G journey when the telcos started deploying and offering 5G commercially to the customers in October 2022. Three years later, the official 5G BTS count has crossed half a million.
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The figure could have been much higher if BSNL (Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited) and Vodafone Idea (Vi) had also driven their 5G rollout. The 5G rollout from Vodafone Idea (Vi) has just started and thus, the number of 5G BTS is expected to grow signficantly over the next two years as BSNL will also join the mix.
The count has gone up from 467,620 in January 2025 to 504,588 in September 2025. Rajasthan, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Gujarat, are the states where there are more than 30,000 5G BTS are present. Uttar Pradesh is the only state in the country which has more than 50,000 sites.
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The Indian telecom operators have been given additional time to submit the 5G EMF (electromagnetic field) certificates. The last date for the EMF submission is now December 31, 2025. At present, Airtel and Jio have moderated their 5G capital expenditure (capex) and thus the tower rollout from them has been slowed down. However, this is the time where Vodafone Idea and BSNL will start increasing their rollout speed for 5G. While Vi has started, BSNL is yet to even start commercially rolling out 5G for the users.
