64% of India will use internet by 2023; phone usage to surge to 68%: Report

India will witness more than two fold increase in the number of internet users with an estimated 907 million users by 2023, a Cisco report said. The number of internet users at the end of in 2018 stood at 398 million.

According to the annual internet report by the global networking solutions provider, this will lift the percent of the population in the country using internet to 64 per cent as compared to 29 per cent in 2018. This will be almost at par with the global average which is expected to be around 66 per cent by the same time.

Growing number of mobile users coupled with low cost of data are seen as major reasons behind this surge.

According to Cisco report, there will be 966 million total mobile users by 2023, comprising 68 per cent of Indian population, as compared to 56 per cent in 2018. While smart phones will account for 38 per cent (781 million) of all networked devices by 2023, televisions will be the second most connected devices with a share of 12 per cent of all such devices. In aggregate, there will be 2.1 billion networked devices in the country by this period.

"As digital literacy, mobile penetration, and internet connectivity grow deeper into the hinterland, a massive shift will be created in internet usage and consumption patterns across the country. This rise in connectivity and changing consumption patterns will challenge service providers’ ability to service their customers in an optimal manner," said Anand Bhaskar, Managing Director, Service Providers Sales, Cisco India and SAARC.

On the 5G connected devices in India, the report said that there will be 67.2 million 5G connections in India by 2023. "One in twenty connections will be 5G with a share of 4.9 per cent of all devices."

4G connections will remain predominant in the country with 53.1 per cent of total mobile connections remaining on this spectrum. 3G and below connections will be 38.7 per cent of total mobile connections.

A growing number of machine-to-machine (M2M) applications, such as smart meters, video surveillance, healthcare monitoring, transportation, and package or asset tracking, are the main drivers of growth of devices and connections in the country, it said.

The report also noted that there will be 46.2 billion mobile applications downloaded by 2023, a rise of more than two times from 2018 level. "There will be 17.8 billion social networking, messaging, media, productivity, and e-commerce mobile applications downloaded by 2023, up from 9.2 billion mobile applications in 2018," it added.

The majority of such downloads will be of gaming applications as the report estimates around 10.5 billion such applications being downloaded in 2023.