Nigeria’s internet-use share reached 41.2%

At the World Bank’s latest observation, internet users account for 41.2% of Nigeria’s population. That makes the newsworthy number a measure of both participation and its complement: most Nigerians are not counted as internet users in this indicator. From Nigeria’s vantage, the central comparison is with its own starting point, which was effectively zero in 1990, and with the large share still outside the measured online population.

To place that national picture alongside Kenya and Ethiopia, look at the endpoints rather than inferring a common route between them. All three begin at zero in 1990. By 2024, Nigeria has the highest internet-use share of the three, Kenya is next and Ethiopia is lower. The United States is included as wider context, not as a target for the African countries. The indicator identifies the population share using the internet; it does not describe frequency, quality or purpose of use.

The second measure changes the latest ordering. In 2024, Kenya records 126 mobile cellular subscriptions per 100 people, above the United States reading of 113; Nigeria records 70.8 and Ethiopia 65.1. In the chart, look only for those endpoint positions and the move from zero at the beginning of the available observations to the latest values. Subscription density can exceed the population count because this measure counts subscriptions, not unique subscribers, so it is not an internet-use share.

Reading the two 2024 endpoints together reveals a mismatch in ordering, not a conversion rate. Kenya has the densest subscription count among the countries shown, yet Nigeria has the higher internet-use share of the two. Ethiopia has the lowest latest value on both measures among the three African countries. These comparisons are most useful on their own terms: one series counts subscriptions relative to population, while the other reports the share of people using the internet.

Mobile-subscription density and internet use do not produce the same latest country ordering.