NCC: Despite Improvement in 5G Coverage, Divide Persists in Network Quality

Emma Okonji

Despite improvement in 5G coverage areas and quality of service from the third and fourth quarters of 2025, an industry performance report has revealed that divide persists in network quality between rural and urban connectivity, from the subscribers’ perspective.

According to the Q4 2025 Industry Performance Report, released yesterday by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), in Lagos the 5G coverage gap in Q3 was 70.9 per cent, but the gap reduced to 55.4 per cent in Q4 2025, which was an improvement.

The report also explained that in Abuja, 5G coverage gap in Q3 2025 was 65.6 per cent, but it reduced to 47. 4 per cent in Q4 2025, which was an improvement in the federal capital city.

Presenting the report during a webinar organised by the NCC, the Director, Technical Standards and Network Integrity at NCC, Edoyemi Ogoh, highlighted the disparity in network quality between rural and urban connectivity, in relation to download and upload speed.

According to him, for urban areas, the median download speed in Q4 2025 was about 20.5mbps across all networks, but in rural areas, the median download speed was 11mbps.

He also highlighted the video quality gap between urban and rural areas, which dropped in Q4 2025, compared to what was obtained in Q3 2025.

According to the report, in Q3 2025, rural download speed was 12.7mbps but dropped to 8mbps in Q4 2025.

From the report, about 50 per cent of Nigerian subscribers with 5G devices do not have access to 5G services, because there are no 5G services in the areas they want to access, which indicates that there is still a gap in 5G coverage, despite the improvement in coverage areas.

From the operators’ perspective, in terms of latency, MTN, Airtel and Globacom are doing relatively well in connectivity performance in the urban areas, but Globacom and T2 are not doing relatively well in rural connectivity, which demands that both Globacom and T2 need to step up their networks in rural connectivity.

According to Ogoh, the increase in urban download speed was a result of additional sites added in urban areas, which is well over 2,800 sites installed in the urban areas, and a lot of spectrums were utilized in urban areas to address network congestion.

It noted that for national network performance, MTN data showed a strong national performance, consistently delivering high download/upload throughput and good latency and jitter values.

Airtel holds a competitive profile, particularly in download speeds, latency still shows a gap for improvement.

Data showed strong performance within urban areas thanks to robust 4G, but this advantage diminishes as the sector shifts to 5G.

Furthermore, T2 analysis showed variable performance, with occasional high-speed peaks with challenges across regions.

Data indicates gap for improvements in the overall national quality of service in the assessment.

Globacom data, according to the report, indicated performance challenges, primarily due to latency and jitter that negatively impact user experience.

From the report, 4G was still the backbone for data connectivity in Nigeria, as 5G was under-delivering, based on subscribers’ expectation because the coverage gap is still high at 47.4 per cent in Q4, 2025.