ITU Counts 6.3 Billion Online in 2026, But 2 Billion Still Offline

An estimated 6.3 billion people — 76 per cent of the world's population — will use the Internet in 2026, according to the International Telecommunication Union's Facts and Figures 2026 report. The headline number, up from a revised 6.1 billion, or 74 per cent, a year earlier, conceals a harder one: 2 billion people remain entirely offline.

The ITU published its annual connectivity assessment on 3 November, and the tension inside it is familiar. Usage is rising, income-based gaps are narrowing, and yet the distance between rich and poor markets has rarely looked starker when measured by technology generation rather than raw connectivity.

What does 76 per cent connectivity actually hide?

Internet use stands at 93 per cent in high-income countries against 32 per cent in low-income countries. Put another way, roughly two in three people in the poorest nations still lack any connection at all, while the richest are approaching saturation.

The generation gap is wider still. Some 97 per cent of the global population now lives within reach of at least a 3G signal — near-universal legacy coverage. But 5G reaches only 59 per cent of humanity, and that figure splits into 86 per cent coverage in high-income countries versus 4 per cent in low-income ones. A twenty-one-fold gap in advanced network availability sits underneath a headline that reads "three-quarters connected."

Usage volumes tell the same story. Average monthly mobile broadband traffic per subscription runs at 20 GB in high-income countries, roughly six times the 3.4 GB recorded in low-income ones. Coverage, in other words, is not the same as use — and use is not the same as meaningful use.

Who is connected, and who is not?

The report's demographic breakdowns show divides narrowing but far from closed:

• Gender: 79 per cent of men use the Internet versus 74 per cent of women; the ratio of women to men online has risen to 0.94.
• Age: 86 per cent of people aged 15 to 24 are connected, compared with 74 per cent of the rest of the population.
• Location: 82 per cent of urban residents have Internet access against 63 per cent in rural areas — a narrowing but persistent gap.
• Handsets: 84 per cent of the population aged 10 and over own a mobile phone; ownership tops 95 per cent in high-income countries but reaches only 57 per cent in low-income ones.

Is affordability finally improving?

Prices continue to fall in relative terms. The global median price of a data-only mobile broadband basket dropped to 1.2 per cent of gross national income per capita, while fixed broadband fell to 2.3 per cent.

Two vulnerable country groups crossed a recognized threshold for the first time in 2026: landlocked developing countries and small island developing states both met the widely used 2 per cent-of-GNI affordability target for mobile broadband.

The caveat follows immediately. In least developed countries, the median mobile broadband price still stands at 6.1 per cent of GNI per capita — more than three times the target and five times the global median. Worldwide, three in ten economies meet neither the fixed nor the mobile affordability benchmark.

Why the ITU frames this as an AI story

ITU Secretary-General Doreen Bogdan-Martin tied the offline population directly to the technology cycle now dominating operator and vendor roadmaps. "In the age of AI, being offline means being shut out of countless opportunities, from education to employment," she said. "Now more than ever, we need to expand connectivity and make it meaningful for everyone, everywhere."

Cosmas Luckyson Zavazava, Director of the ITU's Telecommunication Development Bureau, stressed that raw access is insufficient without capability to use it. "Facts and Figures 2026 shows us the significant progress achieved so far and the work that lies ahead of us to translate access to digital technologies into meaningful connections that can improve people's lives," he said. "For this to happen, we should also prioritize the delivery of digital skills. Without digital skills and meaningful connectivity, the benefits of technologies risk remaining out of reach for many, reinforcing existing digital divides."

The ITU defines meaningful connectivity as everyone using the Internet under optimal conditions, at an affordable cost, wherever and whenever they need it — a standard considerably stricter than a 3G signal reaching a village.

The report's argument, in effect, is that AI's benefits will accrue along existing connectivity fault lines unless affordability, availability, quality of service and digital skills close together. With 5G reaching one person in twenty-five in low-income countries and LDC data prices still above 6 per cent of GNI per capita, next year's edition will show whether the 2 billion offline shrinks any faster than the roughly 200 million a year implied by the 2025-to-2026 gain.