The numbers tell a difficult story for Telkom Kenya. Between December 2025 and March 2026, the telecoms operator haemorrhaged more than 160,000 mobile subscribers, with its user base collapsing from 744,902 to just 584,438. To put that in perspective, more than one in every five of its customers walked off the network within a single quarter — a rate of departure that would alarm any boardroom.
What makes the figures all the more striking is the timing. The same three months during which Telkom was losing users saw Kenya’s mobile market post record expansion, with 5.7 million new subscriptions added nationally. Across the industry, operators were welcoming new customers in their millions. Telkom was moving in the opposite direction entirely.
The sustained attrition has reshuffled Telkom’s standing in the market in ways that would have seemed unlikely just two years ago. The company, which once held third place among Kenya’s mobile operators, has now slipped to fifth — overtaken by Equitel, which serves 1.5 million subscribers, and Jamii Telecommunications’ Faiba network, which has reached 883,944 users. The decline happened in under two years, a pace that industry observers describe as steep even by the standards of a fast-moving sector.
Analysts who track Kenya’s telecoms landscape point to a cluster of structural weaknesses that have left Telkom exposed. Gaps in network coverage remain a persistent complaint, driving subscribers towards rivals with stronger infrastructure. At the same time, the brand has struggled to maintain visibility in a market dominated by Safaricom and Airtel, whose agent networks and advertising reach are considerably broader.
The deeper problem, according to analysts, is the absence of a compelling digital financial services offering. Safaricom’s M-Pesa has for years served as the gravitational centre of customer loyalty — once users are embedded in the ecosystem, switching costs are high. Airtel Money provides a credible second option. Telkom, without a comparable mobile money platform, has been unable to build that kind of stickiness, leaving subscribers with fewer reasons to remain on the network.
The growing appetite for data services and smartphone connectivity has compounded the challenge. As more Kenyans shift towards data-heavy usage patterns, operators with the resources to invest in high-speed infrastructure and digital ecosystems have pulled well ahead. Telkom, constrained by its scale, has found it difficult to keep pace with that investment curve.
Whether the company can reverse the trend remains to be seen. For now, the Q1 2026 data presents a stark picture of a network losing ground on every front — and with well-funded competitors continuing to grow aggressively, the path back to relevance looks increasingly narrow.
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