Mobile phone user penetration in Latin America 2013-2019

Mobile phone user penetration as share of population in Latin American countries from 2013 to 2019

Characteristic	Chile	Argentina	Colombia	Mexico	Brazil	Peru	Other
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-

Download

Source

Show detailed source information?

Already a member?

Source

Release date

August 2015

More information

Region

Central and South America

Survey time period

April 2015

Supplementary notes

Individuals of any age who own at least one mobile phone and use the phone(s) at least once per month; numbers may not add up to total due to rounding
* Forecast

Citation formats

The statistic shows the mobile phone user penetration rate in Latin America by country from 2013 to 2019. For 2017, the mobile phone user penetration rate in Argentina is forecast to reach ** percent.

Mobile penetration rate in Latin America – additional information

The number of mobile phone users in Latin America is expected to pass the *** million mark in 2016. By that time more than ** percent of the population in Latin America is projected to own and use a mobile phone. By 2018, the mobile user penetration rate is expected to reach more than of the population in several Latin American countries. The number of smartphone users in Latin America is also forecast to grow strongly over the next few years, from around *** million in 2015 to more than *** million in 2019. According to the GfK, more than 100 million smartphones were sold in 2014 and 2015 and a similar amount is expected to be sold in 2016 as well.

Though Mexico’s mobile phone uptake in general remained average compared with many of its neighbors in Latin America, the total number of mobile subscriptions in Mexico has been above 100 million since 2012, according to ITU. In 2015, there were more than ** mobile subscriptions per 100 inhabitants, which put Mexico in fourth place among markets in Latin America. The share of mobile phone user population in each Latin American country is forecast to remain more or less unchanged through to 2019, with most of mobile users coming from Chile, Argentina and Colombia.

Smartphone penetration rate in Latin America is set to follow a similar trend to be among those to see the most rapid growth in the coming years. By 2019, half of the mobile phone users are projected to be smartphone users in Latin America, up from **** in 2014. Latin America’s internet usage on smartphones is also growing during the same period, in part due to mobile broadband advancement and smartphone device adoption. Mobile phone internet user penetration rate in Latin America is expected to increase from about ** percent in 2016 to over ** percent in 2020.