Reliance Jio has once again demonstrated why it remains India’s dominant telecom operator. TRAI’s September data shows Jio driving the bulk of the country’s core mobile subscriber growth, while Bharti Airtel recorded its weakest monthly expansion in recent months.

As per the analyst reports, India’s core mobile subscriber base excluding machine-to-machine (M2M) connections grew by 2.2 million month-on-month to 1.15 billion. Of this, Jio added 1.9 million subscribers, while Airtel managed only 0.2 million, making Jio’s contribution nearly ten times larger than Airtel’s. Jio dominated the overall subscriber number for September with 511.14 million subscribers, maintaining a clear lead over Airtel’s 494.29 million. 

Airtel loses momentum

Airtel’s 0.2 million core mobile subscriber addition was its lowest in recent months. Analysts attributed the slowdown to the discontinuation of its affordable ₹299 prepaid plan in August, which appears to have weakened its ability to attract and retain price-sensitive mobile users.

Although Airtel’s gross wireless subscriber additions was 2.69 million, the much smaller core-mobile user gain suggests that a significant portion of its additions have come from low-ARPU M2M connections rather than regular mobile customers.

Active users tell the bigger story

Jio’s advantage is even clearer in active subscribers. The industry-wide core visitor location register (VLR) grew by 0.6 million in September, but Jio alone added 1.3 million active users.

Airtel, by contrast, lost 0.2 million active subscribers during the month, while Vodafone Idea lost 0.3 million. This means Jio was the only major private operator to expand its active user base, reinforcing the strength of its customer engagement and network usage.

The race has a clear leader

September’s TRAI numbers show Jio not merely holding its lead but widening it. It added more core mobile subscribers, more active users, and ended the month with a larger total base than Airtel.

For Airtel, the challenge is to reverse its slowing core-user momentum after withdrawing the ₹299 plan. For Jio, the data confirms its position as the primary engine of India’s mobile-market growth adding nearly nine out of every ten core wireless subscribers gained by the industry in September.