Nokia: India to reach 1 billion 5G subscribers by 2031
Big news for tech lovers: India is on track to top 1 billion 5G subscriber base by 2031, says Nokia's latest Mobile Broadband Index.
Nearly half of all mobile data in India is already running on 5G, and the country's monthly 5G data traffic grew 70% year-on-year to reach 12.9 exabytes in 2025.
India average monthly data 31GB 2025
With more people streaming in 4K, gaming on the cloud, and using AI-powered apps, average monthly data usage per person rose to over 31GB in 2025.
While big cities still lead with most of the traffic, smaller towns are catching up fast.
In device stats for 2025: India had about 892 million active 4G devices and over 383 million phones ready for 5G, plus most new phones shipped now support it.
The report also points out that networks will need to get smarter as AI becomes a bigger part of our digital lives.