Internet accessibility may be improving in South Africa, but its quality is still below the global average.
Using its 2023 Digital Quality of Life Index, Surfshark was able to look at internet inequality by analysing two DQL indicators – internet speed and time to work to afford it in respect to countries’ economic well-being . “The gap is smaller when it comes to mobile internet, but only affordability-wise. Lower-income countries work 1.6 times more for 3.1 times slower internet compared to high-income countries. On average, people living in higher income countries enjoy mobile internet speeds of 96 Mbps for 1 hour 41 min of work per month, while lower-income countries get only 32 Mbps for more than 2 hours 37 min of work.
However, looking more positively, it takes a far smaller amount of time for South Africans to afford the cheapest mobile data package. The global average is 7,158 seconds, whilst in South Africa, it is 5,162 seconds.