If you are interested in what smartphones are doing well in the Nigerian market, our list of the most popular phones on Mobility Nigeria in 2023 will come in handy for you. Why? Our stats here generally correlate with phone sales and shipment stats in the country. In other words, if you want to know which phone brands are dominating the Nigerian smartphone market, a good place to look is the list of the most popular phones on Mobility Nigeria.
This list isn’t an accurate guide of which smartphones sell more than others, but it is a valid guide as to what brands people are interested in the most and what brands likely top th sales charts. Anyway, we went to work to glean the information for you as published in this article on the most popular phones on Mobility Nigeria in 2023.
Table of Contents
Top 5 Popular Phones on Mobility Nigeria in 2023
Here is our list, starting from number 5 down to the very most popular phone.
Number 5: itel A60
itel A60 is a 2023 release with a 6.6-inch HD display, 2GB RAM, 32GB storage, and up to 128GB expandable storage slot. The battery capacity is 5000mAh. There is a fingerprint scanner, face unlock, and support for 4G LTE.
Number 4: Infinix Smart 7
The Smart 7 from Infinix features a 6.6-inch TFT display with a water drop notch, a Helio A22 chipset, 4GB RAM, 64GB built-in storage, and a 5000mAh battery. It is a 4G LTE device released this year.
Number 3: itel S18
itel markets the S18 as a selfie Vlog phone. The major specs include a 6.6-inch display, an 8-megapixel selfie camera, 2GB RAM, 2GB extended RAM, 64GB built-in storage, Face Unlock, and a fingerprint sensor. The battery capacity is 5000mAh. itel S18 was released in October 2022.
Number 2: itel S18 Pro
In second place is the itel S18 Pro, basically the S18 with some souped up specs. Those enhanced features include a 32-megapixel selfie camera, 4GB RAM, and 3GB expandable RAM. Pretty much everything else is the same.
The Most Popular Smartphone: itel P40 Plus
And the most popular smartphone on Mobility Nigeria in 2023 is the P40, also from….itel. Why is it so popular? Perhaps it is the specs-to-price ratio. The specs include a 6.8-inch, 90Hz punch hole display, 4GB RAM, 4GB extended RAM, 128GB built-in storage, a massive 7000mAh battery, and 18W fast charging.
itel pretty much made a clean sweep of the charts. Or more accurately, Transsion, the parent company of itel and Infinix.
Entry-level smartphones are the most popular
Looking at the above list, there is a pattern we see – these are all affordable, entry-level Android smartphones. Seeing as the most popular phones on Mobility Nigeria in 2023 are all entry-level phones, it would appear that affordability is the strongest driving force for many of our readers.
itel almost totally dominates the entry-level smartphone market. You will be hard pressed to find any smartphone from Xiaomi, Vivo, or Apple in the same price bracket that itel plays. Samsung and Nokia usually have one model apiece in that category, but itel floods that market with multiple options. Which is why it is no surprise that of the five most popular phones on Mobility Nigeria in 2023, four of them are itel models.
Just above itel’s entry-level playground are brands like TECNO, Samsung, Infinix, and Xiaomi. It often comes as a surprise to the uninformed when they see sales stats of phones in Nigeria and do not see their favourite brand at the top. It never comes as a surprise to us here, though.
Who Will Challenge itel At The Low-end?
Unless a brand plays heavily in the entry-level market, they have no chance of dominating the Nigerian smartphone market. It really is that simple. 90% of Nigerians buy phones that cost less than ₦100,000. Nigeria is an extremely price-sensitive market. If people cannot afford your product, they simply cannot; they will buy what they can afford.
For example, a number of us here at Mobility Nigeria are convinced that Xiaomi’s recent sharp price slash for its Redmi 12C model is a direct response to itel’s fresh foray into the lower end of the mid-range market with a product like the S23. It is a smart move to respond when your competitor begins to nibble at your toes.
We will keep updating this list for as long as any changes occur in the statistics. Keep this page bookmarked.
Mister Mobility 
Media Partner