The total mobile services revenue in the Philippines is set to increase at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 2.7% from $3.8 billion in 2023 to $4.3 billion in 2028, mainly due to the rising adoption of mobile data services, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

According to Global Data’s Philippines Mobile Broadband Forecast (Q2 2023), while mobile voice service revenues will decline at a CAGR of 10.2% between 2023 and 2028, in line with the drop in mobile voice (average revenue per user) ARPU levels, mobile data service revenue will grow at the fastest CAGR of 4.8% due to rise in the adoption of 5G services.

The average monthly mobile data usage is forecast to increase from 6.6 GB in 2023 to about 27.1 GB in 2028, driven by the growing consumption of high-bandwidth online video services and social media content over smartphones.

Kantipudi Pradeepthi, Telecom Analyst at GlobalData, says: “4G will remain the leading mobile technology by subscriptions in the Philippines until 2026. 5G subscriptions will surpass 4G subscriptions and go on to account for 69% share of the total mobile subscriptions in 2028, driven by the network expansion initiatives by the telecom regulator and mobile operators.

“Globe and PLDT will remain the market leaders through the forecast period. DITO Telecommunity, which commenced its operations in March 2021 in the country, has been adding new subscribers to its network through a range of promotional mobile service plans with unlimited texts and free voice minutes at prices starting from PHP99.”