Airtel Accelerates 5G Expansion, Deploys Over 1,000 New Sites Across Nigeria

 Airtel Accelerates 5G Expansion, Deploys Over 1,000 New Sites Across Nigeria

By Adetola Odusote

Airtel Nigeria has intensified its 5G network expansion across the country, integrating more than 1,000 new 5G sites within the past year as it seeks to extend high-speed connectivity to more Nigerians and support the growing demands of the digital economy.

The latest deployment represents a significant acceleration in Airtel’s network investment, with 759 new 5G sites integrated since December alone. The expansion has extended the operator’s fifth-generation network beyond its initial coverage areas, particularly across major cities and urban centres.

Airtel launched its commercial 5G service in Nigeria in June 2023, becoming one of the early operators to introduce the technology into the country’s telecommunications market. The scale of the current rollout underscores the company’s renewed focus on expanding network capacity as demand for data-intensive services continues to rise.

Airtel Chief Technology Officer, Harmanpreet Singh Dhillon, said the company’s network expansion was driven by the changing connectivity needs of consumers and businesses.

“The scale of our 5G deployment reflects the pace at which Nigeria is becoming a digital economy. Customers are using more data, businesses are moving more of their operations online, and new technologies such as artificial intelligence are creating entirely new demands on connectivity,” Dhillon said.

He said Airtel was focused on building a network capable of supporting both existing and emerging digital applications.

“Our objective is to provide customers with a network that is faster, more responsive and capable of handling significantly greater volumes of data. We are continuing to expand 5G across key locations so that more Nigerians can experience the benefits of the technology as the ecosystem develops,” he added.

The wider availability of 5G is expected to improve the experience of consumers using data-intensive services, including video streaming, online gaming, video conferencing, cloud applications and other digital platforms. It also offers smartphone users greater opportunities to take advantage of newer devices and applications that require higher network capacity.

For businesses, the technology provides increased capacity and lower latency, supporting digital payments, cloud-based applications, e-commerce, remote collaboration and digital marketing.

Larger enterprises can also leverage 5G for more sophisticated connected applications, advanced cloud services, industrial systems and other data-intensive operations.

The impact could extend to education, where faster connectivity can facilitate virtual classrooms, digital learning platforms, collaborative tools and access to richer educational resources.

The expansion is also coming at a time of growing interest in artificial intelligence, with AI-enabled applications increasingly dependent on reliable connectivity to access cloud computing resources, exchange data and deliver services to users through connected devices.

Director, Airtel Business, Ogo Ofomata, said the company’s 5G rollout was aimed at providing the connectivity needed by consumers and businesses to participate more effectively in the digital economy.

“The way Nigerians live, work, learn and do business is changing rapidly. Connectivity has become central to that change. As more people depend on their smartphones for work, entertainment, commerce, education and communication, the quality and capacity of the network become increasingly important,” Ofomata said.

She added that the expansion would enable customers to take advantage of emerging digital services with fewer constraints associated with network capacity.

“5G is creating room for a much richer digital experience. It supports the kind of speed and responsiveness that consumers increasingly expect, while giving businesses the capacity to build and deliver new digital services. Our job is to make sure the network is ready for that future,” she said.

The accelerated rollout comes against the backdrop of rising data consumption in Nigeria. Airtel reported that data usage per customer in the country increased by 30.8 per cent during the year to 11GB per month, while smartphone data consumption reached 13.7GB per customer per month.

With more than 1,000 additional 5G sites integrated over the past year, Airtel is positioning its next-generation network as a key component of Nigeria’s evolving digital infrastructure, with applications spanning consumer connectivity, business operations, education, artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies.