At the end of 3rd quarter 2016 (3Q2016), there were 6.3 million actual users of typical mobile broadband services in Portugal (video-telephony, broadband data transmission, Mobile TV, etc.), increasing by 7.7% versus the previous quarter and by 10.5% versus the same period of 2015, representing 49.2% of mobile stations with actual use. The increased use of these services (versus 2015) is associated with an increase in the number of mobile phone Internet users (+14.4% versus 3rd quarter 2015), especially in cases where the service is included in a bundle of offers, and also with the increasing penetration of smartphones.
MEO remains the leading provider, with 43.2% of active mobile stations with actual use, followed by Vodafone with 32.8%. NOS, with a share of 23.3%, was the provider that saw the greatest increase in the number of mobile stations with actual use over the period, increasing its share by 0.9 percentage points.
The penetration of mobile services was reported at 165.8 per 100 inhabitants. The penetration rate of mobile stations with actual use was 123 per 100 inhabitants.
There were 17.1 million mobile stations eligible to use the service. Of these, 12.7 million (74.2% of the total), saw actual use during the last quarter. Excluding tablets/PCs and mobile stations associated with machine-to-machine communications (M2M), there were 11.4 million mobile stations/devices with actual use in 3Q16 (a decline of 0.7% over the previous quarter and a decline of 2.7% over 3Q15).
In the same period, the recent downward trend in pre-paid plans reversed, with an increase of 2.1% from the previous quarter. However, the number of pre-paid mobile stations with actual use decreased by 2.5% in the quarter. At the end of 3Q16, pre-paid subscribers made up 49.3% of the total (falling 2.4 percentage points from a year earlier).
Consult the statistical report:
- Mobile services - 3rd quarter 2016 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1401517
