Internet country code | .sa |
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Broadband - fixed subscriptions | |
Total | 7,890,261 (2020 est.) |
Subscriptions per 100 inhabitants | 23 (2020 est.) |
Internet users | |
Total | 36 million (2021 est.) |
Percent of population | 100% (2021 est.) |
Telecommunication systems | |
General assessment | Saudi Arabia’s telecom and ICT sectors continue to benefit from the range of programs aimed at diversifying the economy away from a dependence on oil, and establishing a wider digital transformation over the next decade; an essential element of this has been the widening reach of 5G networks, which by mid-2021 reached about half of the population and the majority of cities; the MNOs have focused investment on upgrading LTE infrastructure and further developing 5G; this in part is aimed at generating additional revenue from mobile data services, and also to their contribution to the Vision 2030 program; the ongoing pandemic has resulted in more people working and schooling from home during periods of restricted travel; this has stimulated growth in mobile data traffic, while the government has encouraged non-cash transactions and so helped develop the vast e-commerce market; while Saudi Arabia’s fixed broadband penetration remains relatively low, there has been a concentration of fiber infrastructure and the Kingdom has developed one of the fastest services in the region (2022) |
Domestic | Fixed-line are 18 per 100 and mobile-cellular subscribership is 126 per 100 persons (2021) |
International | Country code - 966; landing points for the SeaMeWe-3, -4, -5, AAE-1, EIG, FALCON, FEA, IMEWE, MENA/Gulf Bridge International, SEACOM, SAS-1, -2, GBICS/MENA, and the Tata TGN-Gulf submarine cables providing connectivity to Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Southeast Asia and Australia; microwave radio relay to Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, Yemen, and Sudan; coaxial cable to Kuwait and Jordan; satellite earth stations - 5 Intelsat (3 Atlantic Ocean and 2 Indian Ocean), 1 Arabsat, and 1 Inmarsat (Indian Ocean region) (2019) |
Telephones - fixed lines | |
Total subscriptions | 6.773 million (2022 est.) |
Subscriptions per 100 inhabitants | 19 (2022 est.) |
Telephones - mobile cellular | |
Total subscriptions | 48.198 million (2022 est.) |
Subscriptions per 100 inhabitants | 132 (2022 est.) |
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