Insights · Updated 2026-08
The largest mobile operators in Africa & the Middle East (2026)
As of 2026-08, the largest mobile network operator in Africa & the Middle East is MTN (Nigeria) with about 74.04 million subscribers, roughly 39.7% of its home market. The full ranking below is computed from the MCC-MNC.dev dataset — every listed operator with a published subscriber figure, one row per operator per country.
| # | Operator | Country | Subscribers | Market share |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | MTN | Nigeria | 74.04M | 39.7% |
| 2 | MTN Irancell | Iran | 55M | 43.8% |
| 3 | Airtel | Nigeria | 50.02M | 26.8% |
| 4 | Glo | Nigeria | 49.78M | 26.7% |
| 5 | Vodacom | South Africa | 48.722M | 50.7% |
| 6 | MTN | Ghana | 30.26M | 73.7% |
| 7 | MTN | South Africa | 29.028M | 30.2% |
| 8 | Vodacom | Tanzania | 28.612M | 46.8% |
| 9 | Orange | Egypt | 27.601M | 24.7% |
| 10 | Vodacom | Democratic Republic of the Congo | 26.435M | 55.5% |
| 11 | Etisalat | Egypt | 26M | 23.3% |
| 12 | Mobilis | Algeria | 23.3M | 42.4% |
| 13 | Orange Morocco | Morocco | 19.615M | 33.4% |
| 14 | INWI | Morocco | 19.425M | 33.1% |
| 15 | Djezzy | Algeria | 17.4M | 31.7% |
| 16 | Mobily | Saudi Arabia | 15.06M | 30.6% |
| 17 | Zain | Iraq | 14.9M | 52.8% |
| 18 | Cell C | South Africa | 14.407M | 15% |
| 19 | Ooredoo | Algeria | 14.2M | 25.9% |
| 20 | Orange | Côte d'Ivoire | 13.531M | 38.2% |
Method: figures are compiled and curated by MCC-MNC.dev from public and proprietary sources, manually reviewed (CC BY-SA 4.0) and reflect each operator's most recent published subscriber count, which can differ in reporting date between operators. Explore the underlying rows in the registry or query the free API.