The Ericsson Mobility Report June 2022 shows 8.2 billion mobile subscriptions held by 6.1 billion subscribers worldwide at the end of 2021. With the World’s population at 7.75 billion almost 79% of the population are mobile subscribers. Ericsson data says that 77% of the subscriptions are for smartphones and that 83% have mobile broadband.
The Ericsson Report predicts by the end of 2022 there will be 1 billion 5G subscriptions and that 4G LTE subscriptions will peak then at 5 billion. Combined 4G & 5G will be 72% of subscriptions and that will increase to 86% in five years to 2027 when 4G and 5G subscriptions will be about the same in number.
GSMA in their Mobile Trends 2020 predicted similar total 8.8Bn connections at 2025 shown below. GSMA were less bullish on the migration to 5G and they provided a split of Smart Phone (SP) 3-5G and feature phones and data only devices like PC’s tablets etc.
