According to the latest report on the domestic communications industry's economic operation situation released by the MIIT, in September, the total number of mobile phone users in our country has broken through the 1.2 billion mark, reaching 1.207 billion, and for two consecutive months, the net increase in a single month has exceeded 10 million.
In the first three quarters of this year, the mobile phone penetration rate in our country reached 89.2 units per hundred people, an increase of 6.7% from the end of last year. In nine provinces and cities, the penetration rate of mobile users exceeded 100 units per hundred people. The cumulative net increase in 3G mobile phone users was 134.794 million, with a net increase of 48.728 million in the third quarter, bringing the total to 368 million, accounting for 30.5% of the total number of mobile phone users. Among them, TD users contributed 60.2% to the newly added 3G users, and among every 10 newly added 3G mobile users, 6 were TD users.
In addition, the number of fixed-line telephone users continued to show a downward trend. In the first three quarters, the number of fixed-line telephone users nationwide decreased by 7.751 million, with a total of 270 million, reducing the proportion of the total number of telephone users to 18.3%. The fixed-line telephone penetration rate dropped below 20 units per hundred people for the first time, a decrease of 0.7 units per hundred people compared to the end of last year. However, the speed of network withdrawal has slowed for ten consecutive quarters, with only 658,000 fewer users in the third quarter, which is the lowest value of single-quarter network withdrawal speed since 2011.