Reliance Jio was the lone telecom operator in India which saw its active subscriber base going up in April 2024. The data was shared by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) in its monthly performance indicator report. Jio added 3.06 million active users in April 2024. That took Jio's total active user base to 433.42 million. In addition to this, the total subscriber base of Jio stood at 472.42 million at the same time.
Bharti Airtel saw its overall wireless subscriber base grow by 0.75 million, but its active user base declined by 2.09 million users during the month. This took the active user base of Airtel to 383.32 million while its overall subscriber base stood at 386.52 million.
Read More - Vodafone Idea and BSNL Added Wireline Users in March 2024
Like every month, Vodafone Idea (Vi) saw its active and overall user base decline. Vi's active user base went down by 0.63 million users to 192.64 million. The total wireless user base of Vi stood at 219.08 million at the end of April 2024, as it lost 0.73 million users.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), a state-run telecom operator lost 0.33 million users, and its active user base stood at 47.84 million users. Vi's total active user base stood at 87.02 million users, after losing 1.23 million users.
TRAI data said that Jio had 40.48% of the wireless market share followed by Airtel with 33.12%, Vodafone Idea with 18.77%, and BSNL with 7.46%. When it comes to overall VLR subscriber percentage, Airtel's 99.17% of the subscriber base was active, while Jio's 91.74% was active during the month.
Read More - Vi Lost a Million Wireless Users in Feb 2024: TRAI Data
Comments on the Wireless Business
Reliance Jio is very close to taking its total subscriber base to 500 million. At the same rate of growth, it should take Jio another 12-14 months to reach that milestone. Bharti Airtel, while lost active users one odd month, continue to keep its growth pace at an impressive scale and also has the highest ARPU (average revenue per user) in the industry. For Airtel, the next major milestone would be to reach 400 million users, which should happen in the near future too.
Vodafone Idea (Vi) and BSNL continue to lose users and for Vi to actually raise more money in the future, the telco has to ensure that it can put a full stop to subscriber loss and increase its ARPU. BSNL's active user base has dipped below 50 million, while Vi's active user base is now reaching 190 million.
