Activity report
Edition 2024
(Extracts)
The now saturated mobile telecoms market has remained more or less stable in recent years. With a mobile penetration rate of 129% at the end of 2024, growth in customer numbers has slowed down (+2.4%).
In Switzerland, mobile coverage using modern 4G and 5G technologies is close to 100%. By 2024, between 79% and 86% of the population will already be enjoying 5G+ with very high speeds, and 90% of the population will be covered by 5G+ by the end of 2025.
While operators have already shut down their 2G networks, their 3G networks are also being gradually phased out. This is a global trend. Swisscom announced that it would decommission the 3G network in Switzerland at the end of 2025, while Sunrise will no longer support the 3G standard from the middle of 2025. Salt has still to announce a date for its 3G network shutdown.
Switzerland also has high-performance broadband infrastructure in its fixed network. The economy and the population benefit from competition between different infrastructure providers and services thanks to a wide range of products. Switzerland has a high number of broadband contracts for connections over the fixed network. At the end of 2023, 46.2% of the Swiss population had broadband internet access. Switzerland thus strengthened its position as one of the first three countries in the OECD-wide comparison.
In contrast, Switzerland cannot claim to be the world leader in respect of direct fibre to the home connections (FTTH/B), even though the number of fibre-optic subscribers (FTTH/B) in Switzerland is gradually increasing. At the end of 2024, the estimated number of fibre-optic connections amounted to around 32% of total broadband connections in Switzerland, or around 1.4 million.