Nigeria sits at the centre of Africa’s global internet map. More than 360 terabits per second of subsea cable capacity land on its coastline, enough bandwidth to power a digital economy.
In theory, the country has already won the connectivity battle. In practice, the story is very different. Across Nigeria, weak coordination, fragmented infrastructure and uneven investment mean that much of this capacity never reaches homes, schools and businesses.
The result is a broadband ecosystem where international abundance coexists with local scarcity, and where the promise of a digital future remains unevenly distributed. For ordinary Nigerians, this gap is not measured in terabits per second but in lost sales, missed lessons and unrealised opportunities.
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In Oghara Market, Delta State, 36-year-old Fejiro Ogaga, a small business owner selling handmade clothes, reached for her phone before fully rising from her mat.
“More critically, access is uneven. Urban centres enjoy relatively better connectivity, while rural communities lag significantly behind.”
Overnight messages from customers blinked on her screen, as customers requested prices, sizes and delivery options for the handmade clothes she sells both online and from a small stall in the market.
She replied quickly, only for the familiar spinning wheel to appear. “The messages just stayed there. Once I tried to reply or upload pictures, everything froze,” she stated.
For Ogaga, the internet is not a luxury or a convenience. It is the engine of her business. Most of her customers find her through WhatsApp and Instagram, and delayed responses often mean lost sales.
“Sometimes people think I am ignoring them. They don’t know the network is the problem. By the time the connection comes back, the customer has moved on,” she lamented.
Ogaga has tried different networks, changed to a 4G-enabled smartphone and spent N10,000 monthly on data subscriptions, but to no avail.
On busy market days, congestion worsens, making even simple uploads impossible.
“If the internet worked well, I could sell more and reach customers outside Delta State. Good internet would change my life,” she said.
For Joy Enobong, a 20-year-old student at one of the polytechnics in Nigeria, poor internet access has become one of the biggest obstacles to learning. “Most of our lectures and materials are online now. But videos freeze, connections drop, and sometimes you miss an entire class,” she lamented.
Enobong explained that she often stays up late at night, hoping the network will be less congested, just to download lecture materials. “You can finish your data and still not complete one video.
It is frustrating because education shouldn’t be this difficult,” she said.
Their experiences reflect the everyday reality of millions of Nigerians navigating unreliable connectivity, even as the country boasts one of Africa’s largest international broadband capacities.
Nigeria’s broadband penetration reached 49.89 percent as of October 2025, according to data from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). While the figure represents gradual progress, it remains far below the 70 percent target set under the National Broadband Plan.
More critically, access is uneven. Urban centres enjoy relatively better connectivity, while rural communities lag significantly behind.
The NCC data shows internet access in rural areas as low as 23 percent, compared with about 57 percent in urban centres. This gap leaves over 45 percent of Nigeria’s population, largely rural dwellers, systematically excluded from digital opportunities in education, finance, healthcare and commerce.
Businesses also feel the strain. High data costs and unstable connections force many Nigerians to ration internet use, limiting the growth of e-commerce, remote work and telemedicine, especially outside major cities.
Bosun Tijani, the minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, recently said no fewer than 20 million Nigerians still lack access to internet services.
Studies, including World Bank research on mobile broadband expansion, indicate that improved connectivity can increase household consumption by up to 10 per cent, reduce extreme poverty by eight percent and raise labour-force participation. These gains remain largely unrealised for many Nigerians.
An ocean of unused capacity
Nigeria’s domestic broadband challenges contrast sharply with its international connectivity profile. For instance, there are eight major subsea fibre-optic systems that terminate in Nigeria, primarily in Lagos.
These include the Meta-led 2Africa cable, completed in 2025, with a design capacity of up to 180 Tbps. Google’s Equiano cable contributes 144 Tbps, using advanced space-division multiplexing technology.
Other systems include MainOne, now owned by Equinix, the West Africa Cable System (WACS), Africa Coast to Europe (ACE), Glo-1 and the Nigeria–Cameroon Submarine Cable System, among others.
Industry estimates place Nigeria’s combined subsea design capacity at over 360 Tbps, far exceeding current national demand.
“To put it in perspective, this amount of capacity could support tens of millions of people streaming high-definition content simultaneously,” Temitope Osunrinde, director at Africa Hyperscalers, told BusinessDay.
Yet Nigeria currently utilises only a fraction of that capacity. “Actual internet demand still runs into tens of Tbps. Most of the bandwidth is sitting idle,” Osunrinde added.
Meta has estimated that the 2Africa cable alone could stream more than 36 million HD movies at the same time. For everyday users like Ogaga and Joy, however, this abundance feels distant and unreachable.
“The problem is not under the sea. It is what happens after the cable lands,” Osunrinde said.
Bottlenecks on
Stakeholders argue that Nigeria’s broadband bottleneck lies inland, where fragmentation, duplication and weak coordination undermine distribution.
“The infrastructure is coming into the country, but it is not moving through the country,” Osunrinde stated.
He cited Lagos’s Third Mainland Bridge as an example. Multiple operators have laid separate fibre cables along the same corridor, often duplicating infrastructure.
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“A single 96-core fibre installation can cost about N248 million. That money could be used to extend connectivity to underserved states instead of duplicating routes,” he said.
State-level fragmentation worsens the challenge.
Inconsistent right-of-way fees, prolonged permitting processes and multiple taxes deter investment. In some cases, domestic internet traffic is routed through Europe before returning to Nigeria, increasing costs and raising data sovereignty concerns.
Olugbenga Olabiyi, managing director of Dimension Data Nigeria, said the lack of collaboration carries a heavy economic toll.
“Without coordinated infrastructure investment, the industry will continue to suffer operational inefficiencies, gross margin erosion and poor return on investment. This ultimately undermines broadband penetration objectives,” Olabiyi told BusinessDay.
For consumers, these inefficiencies translate into slow speeds, dropped connections and high data prices.
Searching for a way forward
Recognising the urgency, telecom operators, regulators, tower companies, internet service providers and data centre operators recently convened in Lagos to address Nigeria’s connectivity paradox.
Participants, including representatives from Airtel, MTN’s Bayobab, IHS Towers and Equinix, called for a shift toward collaborative infrastructure models similar to those used for subsea cable projects.
Key recommendations include accelerating Project Bridge, Nigeria’s planned 90,000-kilometre national fibre backbone, under open-access principles. Stakeholders also proposed a National Co-Build Consortium that would allow operators to share routes and costs, reducing duplication.
To address state-level barriers, experts advocated a 36-state connectivity pact with harmonised right-of-way fees and unified permitting portals. Expanding Internet Exchange Points across the country would also help keep more data traffic within Nigeria, they affirmed.
“Financial institutions have cited governance and coordination gaps as reasons for hesitating to fund broadband projects. Open-access models and shared infrastructure could improve bankability, attracting development finance, pension funds and private investors,” Osunrinde stated.
Stakeholders further endorsed the creation of a Connectivity Working Group to map existing infrastructure, align commitments and track progress toward national coverage goals.
What it means for Nigerians
For Fejiro Ogaga, these policy conversations matter only if they translate into real improvements on the ground.
“If the internet were stable and affordable, I would hire more people. I could sell beyond Delta State. My business would grow,” she said.
For Joy, better connectivity would mean uninterrupted classes and fairer competition with peers in better-served areas. “We just want the chance to learn properly,” she said.
Osunrinde believes collaboration is no longer optional, stating that “Nigeria already has the international capacity. What we need now is the will to distribute it efficiently and fairly.”
He added that recent industry engagements signal a potential turning point, affirming that, “Operators are beginning to realise that working together is the only way to solve problems that have lingered for years.”
