Airtel Kenya’s mobile money service, Airtel Money, grew its market share from 2.9% to 7.6% in the year to September 2024. The growth was fuelled by free Airtel-to-Airtel transfers, lower fees than Safaricom’s M-PESA for sending money across networks, and cheaper withdrawal charges.
Over the same period, M-PESA’s market share declined from 97.0% to 92.3%, with Airtel Money steadily eating into its dominance, once reaching 98%, according to the data by industry regulator the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA).
With over 40 million mobile money users in Kenya, affordability has become a key factor for Kenyans when choosing how to transact. “Subscriptions to mobile money services increased from 39.8 million to 40.6 million, translating to a penetration rate of 78.9% during the reference period,” the CA said in a statement.
In 2020, Airtel Money eliminated charges for Airtel-to-Airtel transfers in an attempt to grow its market share. Sending KES 1,000 ($7.7) to other networks costs KES 11 on Airtel Money, compared to M-PESA’s KES 13 ($0.093), while withdrawing the same amount costs KES 29 ($0.22) on Airtel Money—KES 2 less than M-PESA.
Airtel Money has also expanded access points to address past concerns about its limited agent network. In 2024, it partnered with supermarket chain Naivas to increase its agent network.
The Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) has pushed for full mobile money interoperability for unrestricted transactions across networks.
While progress has been made—customers can send money between networks and make interoperable utility and business payments—agent interoperability remains unrealised, despite CBK’s pledge to implement it by 2024. This missing element, which would allow users to access services at any agent regardless of their provider, keeps the ecosystem incomplete and sustains the dominance of larger players like M-PESA.
By September 2024, the overall mobile money agency network had grown to over 365,000 agents, up from 347,700.
Airtel Money’s adoption has also been supported by CBK’s 2024 decision to increase the transaction daily limit cap from KES 300,000 ($2322) to KES 500,000 ($3870) to attract high-value customers and businesses. Customers can keep funds received from other wallets for over a week, eliminating the previous requirement to withdraw or have the money sent back to the sender.
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