China’s three major mobile operators in Q3 booked stable profit gains and continued growth in 5G users six years after the commercial launch of the technology, taking their combined total to a staggering 1.14 billion.

China Mobile added 70 million 5G network subscribers year-on-year to end-September with 622 million.

Both China Telecom and China Unicom switched in March to disclosing network subscribers (from the much higher ‘package subscriber’ figures), making year-on-year comparisons impossible. From the beginning of the year to end-September, China Telecom’s 5G network users increased by 26.3 million to 292.4 million, while China Unicom’s rose by 21.5 million to 225.2 million.

Despite not including Q4 2024 figures for the two, the three operators signed up a combined total of 117.8 million new 5G network subscribers over the past 12 months.

China Broadnet, which introduced 5G in 2022, hasn’t released Q3 numbers. It ended June with 33.7 million, after adding 8.5 million from end-September 2024, data from China’s National Radio and Television Administration showed.

Q3 earnings
China Telecom and China Unicom registered 5 per cent net profit growth to CNY30.8 billion ($4.3 billion) and CNY20 billion, respectively, while the market leader’s was up 4 per cent to CNY115.5 billion.

Operating revenue across the board was flat.

China Mobile was the only operator to disclose mobile ARPU, which slipped 3 per cent to CNY48. Its average monthly data usage increased 8.1 per cent to 17GB. Service revenue was flat at CNY683.1 billion; product sales declined 1.7 per cent to CNY111.5 billion.

China Unicom now reports only integrated package ARPU, which it said remained above CNY100. Both service revenue and product sales were stable at CNY261.6 billion and CNY31.3 billion, respectively.

China Telecom’s 5G penetration reached 70 per cent, with average consumption per month up 11.4 per cent to 22.3GB.