The share gap between Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel\u2019s respective visitor location register (VLR) \u2013 or active subscriber base \u2013 reached an all-time low, after healthy additions by the Mukesh Ambani-led telco in November 2025, according to brokerages. <\/p>\n
Jio gained 1.2 million active subscribers in the month. By contrast, rival Airtel\u2019s active subscriber base declined by 1.7 million, while third-ranked Vodafone Idea (Vi) lost the highest number of active subscribers among its peers at 2.2 million, according to the latest industry data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). <\/p>\n
Active, or visitor location register (VLR) data, put out by TRAI each month, indicates the number of mobile users regularly using a mobile network. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis further closes the active subscriber share gap between Reliance Jio (98.2%) and Bharti Airtel (98.8%) to an all-time low,\u201d Kotak Institutional Equities said in a research note on Friday, analysing the telecom regulator\u2019s data. <\/p>\n
Kotak expects subscriber losses to continue for Vi until further clarity on network capex emerges after the resolution of regulatory matters. <\/p>\n
Vi has lately been aggressively expanding its fifth-generation (5G) network and bolstering its 4G capacity to compete with the top duo. Its chief executive, Abhijit Kishore, in a New Year\u2019s letter to subscribers said that the telco has commenced the next phase of 5G roll-out to cover more cities. <\/p>\n
\u201cNotably, Jio has outperformed Bharti Airtel in active subscriber net additions for the ninth consecutive month,\u201d said Jefferies in a separate research note. <\/p>\n
During November, Airtel\u2019s active subscriber losses were driven by C-Circles (-1.2 million), followed by Metros (-0.6 million) and B-Circles (-0.4 million) partly offset by gains in A-Circles (0.5 million). On the contrary, Jio’s active subscriber gains were largely led by B-Circles (1.2 million) followed by A-Circles and C-Circles, at 0.3 million each, but dragged by Metros (-0.6 million), according to Jefferies.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor both Jio and Bharti, subscriber movements are concentrated in B-Circles and C-Circles, respectively,\u201d the brokerage stated. <\/p>\n
However, the sector\u2019s active subscriber base fell by 3.4 million to 1.091 billion, with its share falling by about 45 basis points (bps) month-on-month. <\/p>\n
1bps is 0.01%.<\/p>\n
The declines in sector-wide active subscribers were broad-based across service areas, led by Metros (-1.8 million) and C-Circles (-1.1 million), with smaller reductions in B Circles (-0.3 million) and A Circles (-0.2 million).<\/p>\n
According to Jefferies, the active subscriber additions of 31 million till November 2025 continue to stand at a nine-year high, despite a drag in that month. <\/p>\n
\u201cActive net additions moderated month-on-month, largely led by month-on-month subscriber losses at Airtel (-1.7 million subscribers vs +2.7 million in October 2025) and lower net additions at Reliance Jio, at 1.2 million (vs +3.9 million in October 2025). Vodafone Idea lost 2.2 million subscribers (vs -0.4 million in October 2025). Others also saw higher net losses vs October 2025,\u201d according to Morgan Stanley.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The share gap between Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel\u2019s respective visitor location register (VLR) \u2013 or active subscriber base \u2013 reached an all-time low, after healthy additions by the Mukesh Ambani-led telco in November 2025, according to brokerages. Jio gained 1.2 million active subscribers in the month. By contrast, rival Airtel\u2019s active subscriber base declined by 1.7 million, while third-ranked Vodafone Idea (Vi) lost the highest number of active subscribers among its peers at 2.2 million, according to the latest industry data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). Active, or visitor location register (VLR) data, put out […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-983259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-telecom"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=983259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/983259\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=983259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=983259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=983259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}