Zimbabweans are still using SMS with 2.7 billion messages sent last quarter

Vy Ross Moyo

SMS traffic in Zimbabwe fell 3.49% to 2.77 billion messages in Q4 2025, POTRAZ confirmed, as WhatsApp and other OTT apps tightened their grip.

Net-on-net SMS dropped 3.33% to 2.39 billion, while mobile-to-other-mobile fell 5.78% to 343.89 million.

International outgoing SMS crashed 30.97% to 815,160, though incoming rose 12.21% to 33.88 million.

The decline contrasts sharply with WhatsApp’s 33.17 Petabytes of usage, representing 20.69% of all mobile data traffic.

YouTube took 9.53%, Facebook 7.89%, and “Other” apps like TikTok and Instagram consumed 61.48%.

Total mobile internet/data traffic surged 11.27% to 160.33 PB in the same quarter.

SMS now contributes just 6.18% of MNO revenue, versus 50.75% for data and 39.16% for voice.

Internet penetration hit 84.55% with 13.25 million active subscriptions, enabling OTT substitution.

Mobile penetration reached 107.04%, meaning most users have data-capable devices.

4G LTE population coverage is 95.9% urban and 29.0% rural, while 5G covers 18.9% of urban residents.

Operators deployed 47 new 5G and 167 LTE sites in Q4 to support data and OTT traffic.

Average Revenue Per User rose 4.13% to ZWG 460.99 despite SMS declines, thanks to data bundles.

POTRAZ said SMS is now primarily used for OTPs, notifications, and machine alerts rather than person-to-person chat.

The report noted a “powerful shift towards more data-intensive consumption habits” across all demographics.

MNOs are repackaging SMS into enterprise and A2P bundles to preserve value as P2P volumes fall.