India Will Have Over 900 Million Internet Users By 2023: Report

The report says over a half a billion users are already using the internet in the country.

The country is set to auction 5G spectrum to Indian telcos later this year.

(Photo: Reuters)

India will have over 907 million Internet users by 2023, accounting for 64 percent of the country's population, a Cisco report said this week.

Over half a billion people already use the Internet in India.

In India, there will be 966 million total mobile users by 2023, up from 763 million or 56 percent of the population in 2018, according to the "Cisco Annual Internet Report 2018-2023".

While smartphones will account for 38 percent (781 million) of all networked devices by 2023, connected TVs will account for 12 percent (255.8 million) of all networked devices, as per the projections. There will be 2.1 billion networked devices in the country by 2023, it added.

The report added that there will be 67.2 million total 5G connections in India by 2023, meaning one in 20 connections will be 5G by that time in the country, while 4G connections will be 53.1 percent of total mobile connections by 2023, and 3G and below connections will be 38.7 percent of total mobile connections.

A growing number of machine-to-machine (M2M) applications, such as smart meters, video surveillance, healthcare monitoring, transportation, and package or asset tracking, are contributing in a major way to the growth of devices and connections in the country.

By 2023, machine-to-machine (M2M) connections will be 25 percent of the total devices and connections, said the report.

Social networking, video streaming and downloads, business productivity, e-commerce, and gaming will drive the continued growth of mobile applications, with nearly 46.2 billion downloaded by 2023.

As per the projections, there will be 1.4 billion mobile connected devices in India by 2023, 697.4 million wired/Wi-Fi connected devices.