BSNL pips Airtel in new mobile subscriber addition, Jio tops chart in Aug: Trai report

New Delhi, Oct 6 (PTI) State-owned BSNL has pipped Bharti Airtel in terms of new mobile customer addition after nearly a year, and Reliance Jio continued to lead the chart in August, according to data published by telecom regulator Trai on Monday.

The number of total telephone subscribers in the country increased to 122.45 crore at the end of August from 122 crore in July.

The growth was driven by the new net customer addition of 35.19 lakh in the mobile segment.

Reliance Jio led the mobile subscriber growth by adding over 19 lakh new customers in August, followed by Reliance Jio (13.85 lakh new customers), and Airtel added 4.96 lakh, the data showed.

BSNL had pipped all telecom operators in September 2024 after a tariff hike by private telecom operators, even though it was providing 3G services at that time.

The state-owned firm recently launched its 4G service across the nation Vodafone Idea was the biggest loser in the segment, with a decline of 3.08 net mobile subscribers on its network in August, according to the data.

Reliance Jio led the broadband segment with over 50 crore customers, comprising its mobile and fixed line connections. It was followed by Bharti Airtel with 30.9 crore broadband connections, Vodafone Idea 12.7 crore, BSNL 3.43 crore and Atria Convergence with 23.5 lakh broadband connections.

In the wireline segment, Reliance Jio was the biggest loser with a decline of 15.5 lakh customers.

The decline in the wireline base of Reliance Jio follows the categorisation of fixed wireless access (FWA) as wireless customers that were earlier reported as part of the wireline segment.

The company started reporting the number of UBR (unlicensed band radio) FWA subscribers from August onwards.

The number of wireless (5G FWA) subscribers increased to 89 lakh at the end of August 2025 from 84 lakh in July, while UBR FWA subscription stood at 2.1 million at the end of August 2025.

The growth in the wireline segment was led by Tata Teleservices with net subscriber addition of 1.17 lakh, followed by Bharti Airtel with 1.08 lakh customers and Vodafone Idea with 24,215 users.

State-owned telecom operators BSNL and MTNL continued to lose customers in the segment. MTNL lost 1.87 lakh wireline connections, and BSNL fell by 5,647 connections.

Bharti Airtel led the M2M (machine-to-machine) cellular mobile connections of 5.26 crore, with a market share of 58.66 per cent, followed by Vodafone Idea, Reliance Jio Infocom Limited and BSNL with 19.4 per cent, 17.94 per cent and 4.01 per cent, respectively. PTI PRS PRS BAL BAL