June 2025 didn’t just close a quarter; it sketched the first clear outline of where Uganda’s attention was piling up online.
In the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) Market Performance Report for the quarter ending June, the country’s social-bundle economy looked like a fast-moving convoy: WhatsApp (9.2 million users) and TikTok (8.8 million) out front, YouTube (6.1 million) holding the middle, and a smaller chase pack; Snapchat (2.2 million), Instagram (1.5 million), X (1.1 million) and Netflix (0.2 million), trying to keep up.
By September, the convoy had picked up speed, with WhatsApp surging to 10 million users, TikTok (9.3 million), and YouTube (6.3 million), reinforcing a pattern that has become hard to ignore: Uganda’s online attention is increasingly concentrated in messaging and video, especially short-form video.
However, UCC does not capture Facebook’s performance, even though it has historically been one of the country’s biggest social platforms. Officially, Facebook has remained blocked since early 2021, even as many users still access it through VPNs.
Within the platforms that are tracked, the September picture also shows a widening spread between the leaders and the rest. Snapchat rose to 2.5 million, while Instagram slipped from 1.5 million in June to 1.3 million. X dropped more sharply, from 1.1 million to 0.7 million, and Netflix halved from 0.2 million to 0.1 million.
Combined reach
Put together, these platforms deliver a combined ‘reach’ that rose from 29.1 million subscribers in June to 30.2 million in September, a gain of 1.1 million. For advertisers, this shows the ‘big-stage’ audience is getting bigger.
WhatsApp’s growth signals expanding reach for direct-to-consumer communication, customer care, and commerce via chat. TikTok’s rise signals a bigger arena for discovery, persuasion, and impulse buying powered by creators and short videos.
YouTube’s steady gains underline a parallel appetite for longer-form explainers, entertainment, and instructional content. The contraction on Instagram and X points to a quiet shift away from older platforms toward formats that reward speed, video, and private distribution.
The shift matters because it changes what ‘visibility’ looks like. A product launch that once lived on a Facebook page and Instagram grid now has to travel through creators, comments, shares, duets, forwards, and groups, more like a chain reaction.
Where the tax story begins
The surge in social media usage has a second, increasingly important implication: taxation of non-resident digital companies that earn income from Ugandan attention.
As WhatsApp, TikTok, and YouTube expand, so does the addressable market for digital advertising, paid promotions, subscriptions, and monetised content, revenues that often accrue to platform owners outside Uganda.
The policy question becomes sharper with every million-user jump: how does Uganda capture a fair share of value created in-country when the seller has no physical presence?
Uganda had for years grappled with the question of taxing corporations without a presence in the country.
Government, under the Income Tax (Amendment) Act 2023, introduced a digital services tax, a 5 percent levy on gross income earned by non-residents providing digital services in Uganda.
This kind of tax design spoke directly to platform-driven markets: a growing user base that translated into growing taxable digital-service income, even when the platform’s offices and servers sat offshore.
However, government repealed it with the proposal of replacing it with a 15 percent withholding tax on income derived by non-residents from digital services offered in Uganda.
The tax provided a shift, given that the withholding mechanisms are easier to enforce.
VAT on non-resident companies
Additionally, in 2021, Uganda Revenue Authority instituted value-added tax on non-resident providers of electronic services such as social media, streaming sites, and other internet-based tech giants.
URA said then that VAT on digital services sought to level the playing field between local service providers that already charge VAT and foreign tech giants that were previously not obliged to collect VAT.
However, considering the growth in social media usage, the possibility of tech giants attracting more revenue in ad spend and promotions provides fertile ground for a new debate on how government could sufficiently tax such an expanded revenue base.
The growth strengthens the logic, both politically and economically, for building better tax pipes around non-resident digital earnings.
Thus, UCC’s social media numbers are not just a popularity chart. They are an early-warning dashboard for where Uganda’s digital value is concentrating, and where the next big tax debate around non-resident platforms should focus.
Telecommunication revenues drop by 9 percent
Meanwhile, telecommunications industry revenue declined by about 9 percent in the third quarter of 2025, dropping to Shs1.62 trillion from Shs1.78 trillion in the quarter ending June.
The Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) Market Performance Report noted that quarter-to-quarter shifts are not unusual and may stabilise when viewed over a longer period.
Telecommunications is widely recognised as a major enabler of economic growth, supporting productivity, innovation, and inclusion across sectors such as trade, finance, education, agriculture, and health.
The industry’s revenues typically come from core connectivity services such as voice, data, network access, and subscriptions, and roaming charges for customers using mobile services outside their home networks.
Operators also increasingly depend on diversified income streams, including bundled services, device and hardware sales, wholesale services, digital advertising and monetisation, and financial services such as mobile money.
Despite the quarterly dip, UCC’s broader revenue picture points to growth over time. In its 2024 annual report, the regulator said total telecom revenue increased to Shs6.47 trillion, representing a compound annual growth rate of about 10.2 percent over the last five years.
UCC also reported that the sector posted 15.5 percent year-on-year growth from 2023 to 2024, reflecting steady expansion driven by data consumption, digital services, and a growing customer base. Mobile money, a major pillar of Uganda’s digital economy, continued to expand during the quarter.
Registered mobile money subscriptions increased to 52.9 million from 51.1 million in a gain of about 3.5 percent.
Active subscriptions within 90 days rose to 35.6 million from 34.6 million, translating into about 2.9 percent growth. UCC also reported that mobile money transaction volumes climbed to 2.3 billion from 2.13 billion in the previous quarter, an increase of about 8 percent, underlining sustained growth in the use of mobile platforms for payments, transfers, and everyday transactions.
The report also shows that Uganda recorded 56.7 million registered mobile subscriptions during the period under review, of which 45.7 million were active within 90 days, up from 44.3 million in the second quarter, an increase of about 3.2 percent.
Active mobile internet subscriptions (30 days) also rose to 17 million from 16.5 million, a growth of 3 percent. Device data indicates that the telecom sector reported 19 million smartphones, 31.5 million feature phones, and 5.6 million basic phones.
The continued dominance of feature phones suggests that, even as mobile internet subscriptions rise, a significant share of users may still be limited in how fully they can participate in data-heavy services, e-commerce, or advanced digital applications.