MTN Nigeria has overtaken MTN South Africa to change into the most important revenue contributor to MTN Group, signalling a serious shift within the telecom large’s earnings construction.
The Nigerian subsidiary greater than doubled its profitability in 2025, in line with MTN Group’s 2025 monetary outcomes launched on Monday.
MTN Nigeria reported $1.926 billion in Chief Working Determination Maker earnings earlier than curiosity, tax, depreciation and amortisation (CODM EBITDA), up from $946.59 million in 2024. The 103.4% year-on-year enhance marks one of the vital dramatic earnings surges throughout the group’s main markets.
CODM EBITDA is the revenue metric MTN’s high resolution‑makers use to evaluate market efficiency, calculated earlier than curiosity, tax, depreciation, and amortisation.
With Nigeria now driving most of MTN Group’s earnings, the nation is prone to form the corporate’s infrastructure investments as its monetary efficiency turns into more and more tied to Nigeria’s knowledge demand, fintech adoption, and regulatory surroundings.
The surge in Nigeria pushed it nicely forward of MTN South Africa, which recorded $1.048 billion in EBITDA in 2025, ending years by which the group’s residence market had been essentially the most worthwhile.
On the similar time, MTN Ghana posted robust development, with EBITDA rising from $849.14 million in 2024 to $1.276 billion in 2025, a 50.3% enhance.
Mixed, the speedy enlargement in Nigeria and Ghana has rewritten MTN’s inside revenue hierarchy, pushing South Africa into third place and signalling a broader shift within the firm’s monetary centre of gravity towards West Africa.
The figures point out that Nigeria generated almost 84% extra revenue than South Africa in 2025, solidifying its place as the corporate’s most precious market. The shift exhibits that Nigeria is now essential to MTN’s earnings but in addition makes the group extra weak to financial and regulatory dangers in its largest market.
Excessive earnings, excessive working prices
Regardless of its robust profitability, Nigeria stays one of the vital costly markets for MTN to function. Operating telecom infrastructure within the nation requires heavy spending on diesel-powered turbines due to unreliable electrical energy provide, in addition to extra safety for distant base stations and dear backhaul connectivity.
Consequently, community working prices in MTN Nigeria are considerably greater than in MTN South Africa. In 2025, MTN Nigeria’s community prices reached $979.55 million, in contrast with $412.69 million in South Africa, making the Nigerian operation almost 2.4 occasions dearer to run.
This distinction additionally highlights an effectivity distinction between the 2 markets.
South Africa spends roughly 39 cents on community operations for each rand of EBITDA generated, whereas Nigeria spends about 51 cents to provide the identical quantity of revenue.
Nigeria’s profitability is essentially pushed by large market scale fairly than operational effectivity.
The size benefit in Nigeria
Nigeria’s extraordinary revenue development displays some great benefits of working in Africa’s largest telecom market. With a inhabitants of greater than 200 million individuals and quickly rising demand for cellular knowledge and digital monetary companies, the nation has change into a important income engine for MTN, which accounts for for 51.7% of Nigeria’s telecom market.
The earnings surge displays a mixture of continued community enlargement, elevated knowledge consumption, and the rising adoption of fintech companies akin to cellular cash, that are opening new income streams past conventional voice companies.
Crucially, the figures spotlight a robust working leverage impact within the Nigerian enterprise. Whereas EBITDA greater than doubled, the price of working the community rose solely barely. Direct community prices elevated from $933.43 million in 2024 to $979.55 million in 2025, representing a modest 4.94% rise.
The widening hole between revenue development and working prices means that the Nigerian operation is changing into extra worthwhile at scale, producing considerably greater returns for each extra gigabyte of knowledge consumed or minute of airtime used.
Strategic implications for MTN
The rising reliance on Nigeria carries vital implications for the group’s technique.
With such a big share of earnings now tied to 1 nation, MTN’s monetary efficiency has change into extra delicate to fluctuations within the Nigerian financial system, together with exchange-rate volatility, regulatory modifications, and vitality prices.
These dangers have already begun influencing company selections. In early 2026, MTN moved to deliver extra of its tower infrastructure below direct management, with the acquisition of IHS Towers, in a bid to scale back dependence on third-party suppliers and achieve tighter management over vitality and upkeep prices.
The technique displays a broader effort to use the price self-discipline of South Africa’s community operations to the high-volume Nigerian market.
For MTN, the problem now’s balancing the immense alternative in Nigeria with the operational and financial dangers that include it.
The nation stands out as the group’s strongest revenue driver, however its rising dominance additionally means the corporate’s future fortunes are more and more tied to Nigeria’s financial stability.
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