Mobile operators in Africa have about a quarter less spectrum than their peers elsewhere, and pay 24% more for each unit of it relative to their revenue, according to a new report from the GSMA, the industry body that represents mobile operators.
The report, Spectrum Policy in Africa, published this month by GSMA Intelligence, found that African operators held an average of about 570MHz of mobile spectrum below 7GHz at the end of 2025, against about 750MHz in the rest of the world.
Measured as spectrum costs as a share of revenue and adjusted for the amount of spectrum held, African operators pay 0.82% of revenue per 100MHz, against 0.66% elsewhere. Licence conditions can push the real cost much higher. In Benin, direct spectrum costs amount to an estimated 7% of operator revenue, but coverage and quality-of-service obligations attached to the licences add a further 66%.
The squeeze is coming from both sides. Average revenue per user in Africa has fallen by almost 50% in real terms over the past decade, and revenue per megahertz per connection is down by more than 69%. Yet the connectivity gap remains wide: 4G networks now cover 83% of Africa’s population and 5G covers 15%, but only 28% of people use mobile internet on their own device, against 66% in the rest of the world.
The GSMA wants regulators to set lower reserve prices at auctions, grant licences of at least 20 years, allow operators to use any technology in any band and publish spectrum road maps. Only nine of Africa’s 54 countries have licence terms of 20 years or more, and only nine have published a road map. It also argues for automatic licence renewals, with more than 200 African licences worth over US$10-billion due for renewal by 2035.
The GSMA estimates that its reforms could extend 5G coverage to an extra 170 million people and add more than $120-billion to Africa’s GDP between 2026 and 2035. Those are its own projections, and the measures it proposes would reduce what its members pay governments.
How South Africa compares
South Africa is better placed than most. It has the fifth-largest spectrum holdings on the continent, after the 2022 auction that raised R14.4-billion, and it is not among the 14 markets the GSMA lists as having above-average spectrum cost burdens. That is consistent with an earlier GSMA study that found South Africa among the world’s most cost-effective markets for mobile spectrum.
South Africa has also already done what the GSMA asks of the continent on the next big band. The report calls for the full upper 6GHz band, from 6.425GHz to 7.125GHz, to be allocated to mobile as the primary band for 6G. In July, South Africa’s National Radio Frequency Plan 2026 identified the entire band for mobile broadband, over the objections of Wi-Fi advocates.
The report also points to Rwanda as evidence against single wholesale networks. Between 2013 and 2022, Rwanda assigned spectrum in the 800MHz and 2.6GHz bands exclusively to one wholesale operator to build out 4G. After it opened those bands to all operators in 2022, 4G penetration rose from about 2% to more than 30% of the population within two years, the GSMA said, even though coverage was already largely in place.
South Africa pursued a similar idea for years in its wireless open-access network, or Woan. Communications minister Solly Malatsi formally withdrew the Woan’s spectrum set-aside last month, leaving Icasa free to license frequencies that had sat idle. The regulator is preparing its next spectrum auction for the 2026/2027 financial year. — (c) 2026 NewsCentral Media
