Mobile ownership

The National Institute of Statistics and Geography reported that 73 percent of the Mexican population reported to have a mobile phone and from that universe, 76 percent reported to own a smartphone. In other words, only 55.9 percent of Mexicans own a device capable of using broadband services.

According to the Federal Telecommunications Institute, by the end of 2016, there were 111 million mobile subscriptions - in a country of 120 million inhabitants - from which 84 percent pertain to prepaid plans and only 16 percent to post-pay/contract plans. Moreover, from all the mobile subscriptions, 75 million were connected to broadband services. In other words, the overall mobile network teledensity is 91 subscriptions for every 100 inhabitants and, when talking specifically of broadband, the teledensity is 61 broadband subscriptions for every 100 inhabitants.

However, the previous information should be contrasted with other data: Mexico has a dishomogeneous population; the distribution of wealth is unequal. For example, the mobile phone teledensity in Mexico City and the northern states of Baja California and Nuevo León is of 126, 118, and 111 subscriptions respectively for every 100 people. However, in the southern states of Chiapas and Oaxaca, the teledensity was 59 and 54 mobile subscriptions for every 100 people. Regarding the broadband teledensity, there are similar patterns: whereas, according to the Federal Telecommunications Institute 2016 Statistical Yearbook, in Mexico City there were 97 broadband subscriptions for every 100 people, in Chiapas, there were only 28 broadband subscriptions for every 100 people.