This digital explosion in Nigeria is triggered in periods like Easter. What used to be a calm religious period has become a peak window for streaming, mobile engagement and digital spending.

Lately, Easter has gone beyond being observed in churches to being consumed across screens.

Pews to platforms

There is still strong church attendance, which has not changed. What has changed is what happens before and after.

Phones are now part of the experience.

Nigeria has over 151 million internet subscribers, almost entirely driven by mobile access. This means Easter is no longer a shared schedule but a personalised, on-demand experience.

The growth of the “digital pulpit”

One of the most obvious changes this year is what I would call the digital pulpit.

Worship is no more tied to location, it moves with the user.

Podcasts, livestreams and recorded sermons are now done alongside traditional services. In many cases, they extend them. A message heard on Sunday is replayed on Monday morning traffic.

The data supports it:

• Faith-based podcast listening is steeply increasing
• More than 90% of streams happen on mobile devices

This is structured engagement not casual listening. Voices like Emmanuel Iren and Femi Lazarus are building large digital audiences. Their content blends theology with production quality, clear audio, clipped messages, and distribution across platforms.

The growth stresses that spiritual influence is longer limited to physical reach because digital distribution now defines it.

What Nigerians are watching: streaming takes over

Easter viewing has changed completely.

It used to be scheduled television, a few biblical films, and fixed times. Now it is on-demand.

• Church services stream live on YouTube
• Films are watched on mobile screens
• Content is replayed, clipped, and shared

At the same time, Nollywood is adjusting.

New titles like Avante (released April 3) are entering a congested digital space, while Behind the Scenes still tops as the highest-grossing Nollywood title into 2026.

Looking at distribution, platforms such as Africa Magic and YouTube are competing for attention, especially for indigenous content. Yoruba and Igbo language productions have seen around 87% growth in viewership and listening over the past year.

Easter is now a competition for attention, not just a moment of reflection.

The gospel streaming explosion

Music is still major during Easter, but the format has changed. Streaming platforms now carry most of the weight.

Data from Spotify shows that gospel and praise streams have grown by over 5,000% since 2021, ascertaining structural growth.

This week, playlists are doing the work once handled by choirs and CDs.

Artists like:

• Nathaniel Bassey
• Moses Bliss
• Dunsin Oyekan

are topping streams.

Dunsin Oyekan’s “Naija Worship” playlist takeover in early April reflects a wider shift. Curation has become as important as creation.

Worship is now on-demand, replayable, and algorithm-driven.

Reading, but differently

Reading has not disappeared, it has just changed shape.

Long books have given way to:

• Daily devotionals
• Short scripture posts
• Mobile-first reading

Apps like YouVersion Bible App are highly used here.

WhatsApp broadcasts and social media captions now carry a large share of spiritual content. It is quick, shareable and constant.

Reflection has been compressed into digital moments.

Gaming: the competitor

There is another aspect to Easter that isn’t usually unnoticed, and that’s gaming.

Holidays create downtime. Downtime drives play.

Titles like:

• Call of Duty: Mobile
• EA Sports FC Mobile

compete directly with films, sermons and music for attention.

Attention is limited.

Even during religious periods, platforms are competing for the same hours.

Social media: where Easter is performed

Easter now lives online.

• Instagram carries fashion and lifestyle
• TikTok spreads choir clips and sermon highlights
• WhatsApp distributes devotionals

What used to be private is now shared.

Easter is no longer just experienced, it is performed.

The economics: follow the data

Behind all this activity is money.

Nigeria’s telecom sector has changed. Data, not voice, now drives revenue growth.

Monthly internet spending has surged, with Nigerians spending an estimated ₦721 billion on data in a single month in 2025.

The beneficiaries are:

• MTN Nigeria
• Airtel Nigeria
• Streaming platforms
• Content creators

There is also a behavioural change.

People are now gifting:

• Data bundles
• Subscriptions
• Digital access

instead of physical items.

Easter consumption can now be measured in gigabytes.

A change driven by pressure

The high prices have made travel and large gatherings more expensive. Many people are staying in, and when they stay in, they go online.

Digital becomes the substitute.

It is cheaper, flexible and fits the moment.

The contradiction

There is a tension at the centre of all this.

Faith encourages stillness.
Technology encourages engagement.

The same platforms that deliver sermons and worship are designed to keep users scrolling, watching and listening.

That tension is not going away.

The change is permanent

Easter itself has not changed, the meaning is the same. But the way Nigerians experience it is what has changed.

Looking at podcasts, playlists, livestreams and even data bundles, we see what Easter is.

It is mobile.
It is personalised.
It is monetised.

And most of all, it is measured in data, in streams, and in time spent on screen.

The report reveals that women are still 14% less likely than men to use mobile internet in LMICs, with approximately 885 million women remaining unconnected. 

It also notes a slowdown in the rate of women’s mobile internet adoption, leaving around 235 million fewer women than men using mobile internet in these regions. Again, about 60% of the unconnected women live in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa.

The eighth edition of the GSMA report examines data on women’s mobile access and use across 15 LMICs, the barriers they face to adopting and using mobile internet and how this compares with men. 

Mobile is the primary way that most people in LMICs access the internet, particularly women.  Most women report that mobile internet positively impacts their lives. It enhances connectivity, supports livelihoods, and provides access to critical services like healthcare, education, and financial services.   

Persistent gender gaps 

The report reveals that more women than ever before (63%) are using mobile internet in LMICs, but persistent and substantial gender gaps in adoption and use remain. Between 2017 and 2020, the mobile internet gender gap narrowed substantially, dropping from 25% to 15%. 

However, progress stalled in 2021 and 2022, when the mobile internet gender gap widened slightly. Promisingly, in 2023, the gender gap narrowed again for the first time in three years, bringing the gap back to 15%, the same level as in 2020, only to remain relatively unchanged at 14% today. The gap remains widest in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, at 32% and 29%, respectively.  

Claire Sibthorpe, head of Digital Inclusion at the GSMA, comments: “It’s disheartening that progress in reducing the mobile internet gender gap has stalled. The data highlights the urgent need for increased focus and investment by all stakeholders working together to close the digital gender divide. The mobile internet gender gap is not going to close on its own. It is driven by deep-rooted social, economic, and cultural factors that disproportionately impact women.

“Our Connected Women Commitment Initiative shows that by taking concrete actions to address women’s needs and the barriers they face, it is possible to drive change. Since this initiative was launched in 2016, our operator partners have collectively reached over 80 million additional women with mobile internet or mobile money services.” 

Affordability, literacy and digital skills remain key barriers  

While 61% of women in LMICs own a smartphone, that still leaves around 945 million women without a smartphone, 230 million fewer women than men, marking no significant change since 2023. 

The affordability of internet-enabled handsets remains one of the top barriers to mobile internet adoption, with the cost of an entry-level handset representing 24% of a woman’s monthly income in LMICs, compared with 12% of men’s.

Literacy and digital skills is the other top reported barrier to mobile internet adoption among those who are aware of mobile internet. 

Even once women are online, they tend to use it less frequently than men and for a narrower range of services, citing barriers including safety and security concerns, affordability (particularly of data, but also handsets) and connectivity experience.  

The GSMA estimates that over the period 2023 to 2030, closing the gender gap in mobile internet adoption in LMICs would add $1.3 trillion in additional GDP. Closing the gender gap in mobile ownership and use over this period would also deliver $230 billion in additional revenue to the mobile industry.  

The Mobile Gender Gap Report 2025 is funded by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) via the GSMA Mobile for Development Foundation, with research funded in part by the Gates Foundation.   

“Closing the uptake gap would increase the continent’s potential to create jobs for its growing population and boost economic recovery in a highly digitalized world.”

According to the World Bank, “on average across countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, 84 percent of a given country’s population had at least some level of 3G mobile Internet availability, and 63 percent had some level of 4G mobile Internet services, but only 22 percent were using mobile Internet services at the end of 2021.”

Digital Technologies

In its report titled “Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs,” released on Monday, the World Bank noted that Africa’s jobs challenge is to put in place business environments conducive to sustainable “good jobs” for its growing workforce.

It noted that Continental Africa’s workforce is estimated to triple by the twenty-second century—from almost 875 million working-age people (ages 15–64) in 2025 to over 2.5 billion by 2100 (UN DESA 2022a).

As a result, the bank noted that Africa’s share of the global workforce would increase from 16 percent to over 41 percent, surpassing South Asia, East Asia, and the Pacific for the largest global share by 2100.

The report said this increase is overwhelmingly led by Sub-Saharan Africa, whose workforce is projected to more than triple, from just over 700 million people in 2025 to 1.3 billion by 2050 and 2.3 billion by 2100.

Meanwhile, it said North Africa’s working-age population is projected to almost double, from 142 million to 203 million people.

According to the World Bank, Africa’s job and technology challenges over the coming years are immense, requiring greater use of better and more appropriate technologies in ways that support good local jobs.

It stressed that good jobs require productive enterprises that can profitably expand production, adding that the challenge of the job presents opportunities for enterprises, households, governments, and civil society at local, national, and regional levels to do things differently and better.

The report said demographic, technological, and market developments provide prospects to design and implement productivity policies and investments that generate jobs-for-all growth and truly shared prosperity.

The report said that with Africa’s share of the global workforce projected to become the largest in the world by 2100, African countries must increase the uptake of digital technologies to drive employment growth for the more than 22 million Africans joining the workforce each year.

The report, which was prepared in support of the World Bank’s Digital Economy for Africa Initiative, examined pathways to produce and promote the expanded use of affordable and attractive digital technologies that are appropriate for Sub-Saharan Africa’s growing workforce and facilitate continued learning through their use.

The World Bank noted that digital technologies have emerged as an essential element of a good jobs strategy for African countries.

To this end, it said: “Africa needs more activist policies that promote the use of digital and complementary technologies, especially affordable, attractive, skill-appropriate technologies that support productive and inclusive jobs.”

“Such policies must target all potential users’ ability to pay for these technologies as well as their willingness to productively use them.”

To boost productive usage, the report urged governments to implement policies that support the development of more attractive digital solutions geared to the skills and productive needs people have while building broader awareness and education.

“Policies that foster innovation and support digital start-up entrepreneurs are essential to ensuring that more Africans use the Internet for jobs and learning, which will lead to higher standards of living.”

“When digital technologies better meet the needs of people, households, and firms, demand for their use will also increase, making Internet expansion more commercially viable and supporting a virtuous cycle of technology-led transformation,” it noted.

Further, the report called for an expedited approach to close the digital divide gap on the continent, saying that of all the regions in the world, Sub-Saharan Africa displays the largest gap between the availability of digital infrastructure and people’s actual usage.