Sometimes the real value of a mobile network only becomes clear when the Wi-Fi fails and the network you normally use for data suddenly cannot keep up.

That happened to me during a four-day trip to Nakuru this past week.

The hotel’s Wi-Fi was slow and inconsistent. Airtel, which has been my primary mobile data connection for more than a year, was also patchy where I was staying. I therefore did what I have done on several occasions when travelling outside Nairobi: I switched to Safaricom and bought a large data bundle so that I could continue working reliably.

It was not the cheapest option. In fact, buying large Safaricom data bundles has often felt unnecessarily expensive when compared with Airtel Kenya and JTL’s Faiba Mobile. But it worked — and at that moment, reliability mattered more than any cost you could put on decent Internet. 

This is why Safaricom’s new Pata More campaign, launched yesterday, could be much more significant than a routine bundle refresh.

Under Pata More, Safaricom is promising customers “more from what you already use.” The campaign spans mobile data, M-PESA and Pochi la Biashara, home and business fibre, devices, insurance and digital customer support. However, the mobile data changes are the aspect that immediately caught my attention because they address one of Safaricom’s longest-running competitive weaknesses: price.

The selected enhancements are substantial:

• KES 20 now buys 250MB for 24 hours, up from 150MB.
• KES 99 now buys 1.5GB for 24 hours, up from 1GB.
• KES 1,000 now buys 21.5GB for 30 days, up from 10.2GB.

The KES 1,000 monthly package is the most important change. Safaricom has more than doubled the allocation without increasing the price. That does not make it the cheapest equivalent offer in Kenya, but it changes the competitive scenario significantly. 

This Was Long Overdue — Seriously

Safaricom has been Kenya’s dominant mobile network for as long as most consumers can remember. Its competitive advantages are well established: national coverage, dependable service, strong distribution, deep brand trust, M-PESA and the financial capacity to keep investing in infrastructure.

But dominance also allowed Safaricom to maintain a noticeable mobile data price premium.

For consumers using significant amounts of data every month — especially younger Kenyans, creators, remote workers, students, gamers and households tethering several devices — that premium became increasingly difficult to justify. Airtel and Faiba gave people a straightforward alternative: keep Safaricom for calls, M-PESA and coverage, but use a second SIM for cheaper data.

That is essentially what I did when I signed up for Airtel’s KES 1,500 Smarta Bundle in early 2025. At the time, it offered 60GB, 900 all-network minutes, unlimited Airtel-to-Airtel calls, 5,000 SMS and Airtel Money transaction-fee cashback. Airtel has since increased the data allocation to 3GB per day — or up to 90GB across 30 days — without removing the generous voice and SMS benefits.

In areas with good Airtel 4G or 5G coverage, the experience can be excellent. In Nairobi and many other cities and towns, I have often found Airtel fast enough that the practical performance difference from Safaricom disappears. That is why I adopted it as my main mobile internet connection and never looked back.

Until, of course, I travel somewhere where the difference reappears.

The Price Comparison: Safaricom Is More Competitive, Not Necessarily Cheapest

At the entry level, Airtel still offers more data for the same money.

Safaricom’s new KES 20 daily bundle gives 250MB, whereas Airtel’s current KES 20 Amazing bundle gives 300MB. Safaricom’s KES 99 daily bundle gives 1.5GB, while Airtel gives 2.4GB at the same price.

The monthly comparison is much closer. Safaricom’s KES 1,000 plan now delivers 21.5GB, equivalent to roughly KES 46.51 per GB. Airtel’s data-only KES 1,000 monthly bundle provides 25GB, equivalent to KES 40 per GB.

That leaves Airtel about 14% cheaper per GB at this tier. Before Pata More, however, Safaricom’s 10.2GB allocation cost approximately KES 98 per GB. The improvement is therefore dramatic even though Safaricom has not quite matched Airtel.

This is an important distinction. Pata More has not eliminated Airtel’s price advantage. It has reduced it from something difficult to ignore to something many consumers may be willing to pay for better reach and reliability.

The Smarta comparison requires even more digging. Airtel’s Smarta 1,000 provides up to 45GB across the month, plus substantial voice and SMS allowances. That is roughly KES 22.22 per GB — less than half Safaricom’s new effective rate.

However, the Smarta data is released at 1.5GB per day. Unused allocations can accumulate and roll over when the customer renews correctly, but a user who needs 5GB today cannot necessarily treat the advertised 45GB as one immediately accessible monthly bucket. I identified this daily allocation as the biggest weakness in my original Smarta review, and it remains an important consumer consideration.

Safaricom’s 21.5GB monthly bundle appears to offer less data but more immediate flexibility. Airtel Smarta offers much more total value, particularly for someone whose daily usage fits comfortably within the allocation and who also values the bundled calls and SMS.

These are not identical products, despite sharing the same KES 1,000 price.

Where Faiba Mobile Fits Into The Picture

Faiba occupies a different but important position in Kenya’s mobile internet market.

Its proposition is especially attractive to data-heavy users in places where its 4G network performs well. The weekly 10GB bundle costs KES 300. Its family packages provide 70GB for KES 1,500, 100GB for KES 2,000, 135GB for KES 2,500 and 175GB for KES 3,000, with the data shareable among additional users depending on the tier.

Those packages can be excellent for a household, Mi-Fi router or small team. At the KES 1,500 level, 70GB works out to roughly KES 21.43 per GB. The 175GB package lowers that to approximately KES 17.14 per GB.

But Faiba has two limitations in this comparison. First, it remains a 4G service while Safaricom and Airtel both offer 5G. Second, its coverage footprint is more limited and location-dependent. A large, inexpensive bundle is only good value if the network works consistently where you live, work and travel.

Faiba therefore remains a compelling specialist choice rather than the most dependable nationwide default for most consumers.

Safaricom’s Real Product Is Not The Gigabyte — It Is Certainty

Price-per-GB tables are useful, but they are not the whole story.

Mobile data is not a commodity if the quality of the connection changes by location. A gigabyte on a fast, stable network is not functionally identical to a cheaper gigabyte that struggles indoors, becomes congested at peak time or disappears altogether when you leave a major town.

I saw this clearly in Murang’a in April 2025 when I tested Airtel and Safaricom from the same rural location. Airtel recorded a 3.82 Mbps download speed and 1.20 Mbps upload speed, with moments where the connection fell to EDGE or disappeared. Safaricom delivered 40.8 Mbps down and 4.49 Mbps up in the same place.

My experience in Nakuru this past week was another reminder that mobile internet in Kenya is contextual. Airtel can be excellent in one location and patchy in another. Safaricom is not perfect everywhere, but it is more likely to remain usable across a much wider range of places.

The regulator’s data broadly supports this perception. In its FY2024/25 assessment across all 47 counties, the Communications Authority of Kenya recorded an overall quality-of-service score of 90% for Safaricom, compared with 79.9% for Airtel and 64.03% for Telkom Kenya. Safaricom also led the consumer quality-of-experience measure, at 77.6% versus Airtel’s 69.7%.

In other words, Safaricom’s coverage and reliability premium is not just about good marketing. It is also captured in independent regulatory measurement as well as in many consumers’ real-world experiences.

Why Pata More Could Disrupt The Status Quo

The latest Communications Authority sector report shows just how dominant Safaricom remains. As of the 31st March 2026, it held 68.9% of active mobile subscriptions and 62.7% of mobile broadband subscriptions.

However, the mobile broadband figure had declined from 64.3% in the previous quarter. This matters because data usage is increasingly where the future value of a mobile customer sits. Voice and SMS have not disappeared, but smartphones, streaming, social media, mobile commerce, AI applications, remote work and digital services are making data the centre of the relationship.

Pata More appears to be a response to this competitive scenario. 

For years, Airtel and Faiba could make a simple argument: our network may not match Safaricom everywhere, but our data is so much cheaper that the trade-off is worth it.

Safaricom is now taking that argument head on.

If the price difference at KES 1,000 is 21.5GB on Safaricom versus 25GB on Airtel’s data-only plan, many consumers may decide that the additional 3.5GB is less valuable than Safaricom’s broader coverage and consistency. That is particularly likely among professionals, frequent travellers, field teams, ride-hailing drivers, creators and small businesses for whom a failed connection has a real opportunity cost.

This does not mean everyone will abandon Airtel or Faiba. Far from it. Airtel’s Smarta bundles remain extremely difficult to beat on total value, while Faiba’s high-volume family packages remain attractive where coverage is strong.

The more likely effect is behavioural:

1. Some dual-SIM users may begin buying more data on Safaricom instead of keeping it purely as a backup.
2. Customers who left Safaricom’s data offers because the premium was too large may reconsider.
3. Existing Safaricom users may feel less pressure to experiment with a second network.
4. Airtel will have to defend its position with network quality, clearer communication and product flexibility — not price alone.
5. Faiba will need to lean even harder into high-volume, shared and router-oriented use cases where it remains distinctive.

The timing is also interesting. Airtel refreshed its Amazing Data Bundles in July 2026, improving monthly offers but reducing several popular daily and weekly allocations. Its KES 99 daily plan fell from 4GB to 2.4GB, while the KES 500 weekly plan dropped from 20GB to 12GB. Airtel still beats Safaricom on these selected price points, but Safaricom is moving closer just as Airtel has reduced some of its most aggressive short-term offers.

That creates an opening.

The Logic Behind “More Data For The Same Spend”

Safaricom has chosen to increase allowances rather than reduce the prices. That is clearly a smart move.

Customers perceive a major improvement in value, but Safaricom preserves the familiar KES 20, KES 99 and KES 1,000 spending points. This helps protect revenue per customer while encouraging people to use more data-intensive services. More streaming, video calls, social media, cloud tools and AI applications can deepen usage and make the network more central to everyday life.

It also makes Pata More bigger than a tariff adjustment. The campaign links connectivity to M-PESA, Pochi la Biashara, fibre, devices, insurance and digital support. Safaricom is effectively arguing that value should be measured across the entire ecosystem, not by a single bundle in isolation.

That ecosystem approach is difficult for smaller rivals to reproduce at the same scale.

So, Which Network Now Offers The Best Value?

This is NOT a winner take all situation because “best value” depends on where and how you use the internet.

Choose Safaricom if:

• You travel frequently across Kenya or spend time in peri-urban and rural areas.
• Reliability and nationwide reach matter more than obtaining the lowest possible price per GB.
• You need a flexible monthly data bucket rather than a daily allocation.
• Losing connectivity carries a meaningful work or business cost.

Choose Airtel’s data-only bundles if:

• Airtel performs strongly in the places where you spend most of your time.
• You want more data than Safaricom provides at the same daily or monthly price.
• You prefer a conventional monthly bucket without Smarta’s daily-release structure.

Choose Airtel Smarta if:

• You want the strongest all-in-one value across data, calls and SMS.
• Your usage fits within the daily allocation or you can accumulate unused data through rollover.
• Airtel coverage is dependable along your normal routes.

Choose Faiba Mobile if:

• You have confirmed strong Faiba 4G coverage at home, work or another fixed location.
• You need large, shareable data allowances for a household, team or router.
• You do not require 5G or consistent nationwide mobility.

For many Kenyans, the most practical answer will remain dual-SIM: one network optimized for value and another for reach. Pata More may not end that behaviour, but it could shift more of the monthly data spend back toward Safaricom.

Safaricom Does Not Need To Be The Cheapest

Pata More is long overdue. Safaricom’s mobile data prices had become increasingly difficult to justify when Airtel and Faiba were offering dramatically more data for the same money.

However, Safaricom’s new offers do not completely close the value gap. Airtel still offers more data at the selected comparable price points, and Smarta remains one of the strongest all-in-one mobile packages in Kenya. Faiba remains formidable for high-volume users within its coverage footprint.

But Safaricom may not need to win a pure price war.

It only needs to make its data sufficiently competitive that consumers stop viewing its network-quality premium as excessive. At KES 1,000 for 21.5GB, the difference against Airtel’s 25GB is now small enough for coverage, reliability and convenience to carry much more weight.

That is why Pata More could disrupt the status quo.

Airtel and Faiba taught Kenyan consumers to expect far more data for their money. Safaricom appears to have listened — and is now combining better value with the one competitive advantage its rivals have still not fully neutralized: a fast mobile data network that is more likely to work, in more places, when you really need it.

The next phase of Kenya’s mobile internet competition may therefore not be won by whoever offers the most gigabytes.

It may be won by whoever offers the best balance of price, flexibility and certainty.

What has your experience been with Safaricom, Airtel and Faiba mobile data where you live, work and travel? Will Pata More change the status quo for you? I’d love to hear your views in the comments.