{"id":6021,"date":"2018-11-01T20:00:08","date_gmt":"2018-11-01T20:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018"},"modified":"2026-01-12T15:59:00","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T15:59:00","slug":"the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018","status":"publish","type":"gsma_theme_resources","link":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Mobile adoption has grown rapidly in West Africa in recent years, helped by the expansion of mobile networks to underserved communities and the increasing affordability of services and device costs. By the end of 2017, there were 176 million unique subscribers across the West Africa sub-region, comprising the 15 member states of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Overall subscriber penetration reached 47% in 2017, up from 28% at the start of this decade. Despite the remarkable subscriber growth in the sub-region in recent years, and indeed across Sub-Saharan Africa, more than half of the region\u2019s population do not yet subscribe to a mobile service.<\/p>\n<p>Visit\u00a0gsma.com\/solutions-and-impact\/connectivity-for-good\/mobile-economy\/west-africa\u00a0for more information.<\/p>\n<p><strong>PDF Downloads:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/2018-04-11-e568fe9e710ec776d82c04e9f6760adb.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 (Report &#8211; English)<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/2018-04-11-dd7760bf439236e808ea61ee986845eb.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 (Report &#8211; French)<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/2018-04-11-a7c70bb20a8025b7abd1f739c8e6e55a.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 (Infographics &#8211; English)<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mobile adoption has grown rapidly in West Africa in recent years, helped by the expansion of mobile networks to underserved communities and the increasing affordability of services and device costs. By the end of 2017, there were 176 &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"image":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/Screen-Shot-2018-11-01-at-3.57.40-PM.png","json":{"gsma_resources_type":"Document","gsma_resources_thumb":"[4356]","gsma_resources_file":"[4355]","gsma_resources_multi":null,"gsma_resources_wgr":null,"gsma_resources_video":"","gsma_resources_image":"[]","gsma_resources_url":"","gsma_resources_date":"","gsma_resources_button":"Download"}},"tags":[],"resource_categories":[],"algolia_discover_type":[2220],"class_list":["post-6021","gsma_theme_resources","type-gsma_theme_resources","status-publish","hentry","algolia_discover_type-resource"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 - GSMA Africa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 - GSMA Africa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mobile adoption has grown rapidly in West Africa in recent years, helped by the expansion of mobile networks to underserved communities and the increasing affordability of services and device costs. By the end of 2017, there were 176 ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"GSMA Africa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/gsma\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-01-12T15:59:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@GSMA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 - GSMA Africa","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 - GSMA Africa","og_description":"Mobile adoption has grown rapidly in West Africa in recent years, helped by the expansion of mobile networks to underserved communities and the increasing affordability of services and device costs. By the end of 2017, there were 176 ...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/","og_site_name":"GSMA Africa","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/gsma\/","article_modified_time":"2026-01-12T15:59:00+00:00","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_site":"@GSMA","twitter_misc":{"Est. reading time":"1 minute"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/","url":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/","name":"The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018 - GSMA Africa","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/subsaharanafrica\/#website"},"datePublished":"2018-11-01T20:00:08+00:00","dateModified":"2026-01-12T15:59:00+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-west-africa-2018\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Mobile Economy \u2013 West Africa 2018"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/subsaharanafrica\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/subsaharanafrica\/","name":"GSMA Africa","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/subsaharanafrica\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"}]}},"cats":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gsma_theme_resources\/6021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gsma_theme_resources"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/gsma_theme_resources"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gsma_theme_resources\/6021\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7035,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gsma_theme_resources\/6021\/revisions\/7035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6021"},{"taxonomy":"resource_categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/resource_categories?post=6021"},{"taxonomy":"algolia_discover_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/algolia_discover_type?post=6021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}