Airtel Beats Jio, Vi to Add Over 3.67 Million Mobile Subscribers in October: TRAI

Airtel has once again surpassed Reliance Jio by adding more than 3.67 million new wireless subscribers in October, according to the telecom subscription report released by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). Airtel added 1.45 million more subscribers than Jio that managed to add 2.22 million wireless subscribers in the same month. Airtel also continued to hold a dominant position in terms of active user base, with 96.74 percent active subscribers on its network.

The latest data provided by TRAI shows that the wireless subscriber base of Airtel reached 330.28 million in October, up from 326.66 million reported for the month of September. This brought the addition of 3.67 million new customers in one month, which was the largest by any telco in that span.

In contrast, Jio retained its crown of being the largest telecom operator in India with 406.35 million wireless subscribers in October. The operator had 404.12 million subscribers in September.

Unlike Airtel and Jio, Vi (Vodafone Idea) saw a dip of 2.65 million subscribers in October that dropped its wireless user base to 292.83 million from the 295.49 million in September. Similarly, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) saw a drop of 10,215 wireless subscribers in the same month to have a total wireless subscriber base of 118.88 million.

On the part of active user base, the report shows that Airtel dominated the competition with 96.74 percent active users on its network. Vi came second with 88.78 percent and Jio remained at the third position with 78.59 percent active users. BSNL, on the other hand, had 61.38 percent active users, according to the TRAI report.

Despite facing a stiff competition from Airtel, Jio was still the largest telecom operator in India with a market share of 35.28 percent in October. The share was, however, down from 35.19 percent reported in September.

Jio was followed by Airtel that stood second with 28.68 percent market share, while Vi and BSNL came third and fourth with 25.42 percent and 10.33 percent, respectively.

The TRAI report also mentioned that a total of 8.80 million Mobile Number Portability (MNP) requests were received in October, up from 8.71 million in September.

Of the total new requests, 4.76 million requests were received from Zone-I that captures Northern and Western India and 4.03 million came from Zone-II that represents Southern and Eastern India. The highest number of MNP requests till date have been received from Karnataka (about 45.81 million), followed by Andhra Pradesh (about 43.28 million) and Maharashtra (about 42.53 million). The cumulative MNP requests increased from 520.80 million at the end of September to 529.60 million in October, as per the regulator.

TRAI also noted in the report that the number of active wireless subscribers in the country in October stood at 960.91 million.

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