For millions of Tanzanians, the mobile phone is no longer simply a communication device.
It is increasingly a wallet, payment terminal, savings channel, borrowing platform, business tool and connection point to the wider financial system.
Mobile money has become so embedded in everyday economic activity that businesses trying to understand the Tanzanian consumer increasingly need to understand not only whether people use mobile money, but how they use it, why they choose one service over another, and what determines whether a transaction remains digital or returns to cash.
TSMR explored many of these questions through a large-scale study involving approximately 2,000 mobile users in Tanzania, examining mobile telephony, internet usage and mobile-money behaviour.
Although this article does not report proprietary respondent findings from that study, the themes investigated provide a useful lens through which to interpret the latest evidence from Tanzania's rapidly evolving digital financial ecosystem.
And the latest market statistics tell a compelling story.
Mobile Money Is Now Financial Infrastructure
Mobile money can no longer be considered an alternative or niche payment channel in Tanzania.
The Bank of Tanzania reported approximately 75.8 million active mobile-money subscriptions in 2025, compared with 63.2 million in 2024. The mobile-money agent network simultaneously expanded to approximately 1.98 million agents.
The scale of activity is even more striking.
In 2025, Tanzania recorded approximately 7.96 billion mobile-money transactions, with a total value of about TZS 255.1 trillion, according to Bank of Tanzania payment-system statistics.
Infographic 1: Mobile money is not simply a financial product in Tanzania — it has become part of the country's everyday economic infrastructure.
But Account Numbers Do Not Tell Us How People Behave
Large numbers of active accounts are important, but they do not explain the consumer.
A Tanzanian may hold more than one SIM card, maintain more than one mobile-money account and use different providers for different purposes.
This is precisely why TSMR's study distinguished between accounts held, active accounts and the respondent's main mobile-money provider, rather than treating account ownership as equivalent to preference or loyalty.
That distinction matters commercially.
For a mobile operator or financial institution, the most important question may not be:
“How many customers have our wallet?”
but rather:
“When customers actually need to make a financial transaction, which wallet do they reach for first—and why?”
This moves the conversation from registration to behaviour.
Convenience, Cost and Trust Compete for the Customer
The TSMR research framework examined several factors that can influence mobile-money provider choice, including:
agent availability, proximity of cash-in/cash-out points, transaction pricing, bonuses, ease and speed of transactions, service diversity, merchant acceptance, account security and trust.
These factors show why competition in mobile money extends beyond transaction fees.
A cheaper service may still lose a transaction if the nearest agent has insufficient cash.
A highly innovative app may struggle with a customer who prefers USSD.
A broad agent network may attract customers, but poor dispute resolution can damage trust.
And a wallet used by someone's family, customers or suppliers may become more useful simply because other people already use it.
Infographic 2: Mobile-money loyalty is built around an ecosystem of value — not price alone.
Sending Money Remains Fundamental
Person-to-person transfers continue to play a major role in Tanzania's mobile-payment ecosystem.
In 2025, P2P transfers reached approximately 607.7 million transactions worth TZS 20.19 trillion, increasing by 26.8% in volume and 28.6% in value compared with 2024. The Bank of Tanzania associates this continued growth with everyday needs including household support, social transfers and emergency funding.
This demonstrates something important about Tanzanian financial behaviour.
Money does not move only between consumer and business.
It also moves continuously between:
parents and children, urban and rural households, friends and relatives, employers and workers, customers and small businesses.
Mobile money therefore sits inside Tanzania's social economy as much as its formal financial economy.
Chart 1: Growth of person-to-person mobile payments. Source: Bank of Tanzania, National Payment Systems Annual Report 2025.
The Bigger Story May Be What Mobile Money Is Becoming
Mobile money began primarily as a mechanism for transferring and withdrawing money.
That description is becoming increasingly inadequate.
TSMR's questionnaire examined whether consumers had used mobile money for activities including:
- deposits and withdrawals;
- airtime and package purchases;
- bill payments;
- receiving or transferring money internationally;
- digital borrowing;
- taxi payments;
- merchant payments;
- online purchases;
- bank-wallet transfers;
- salary payments; and
- business activities.
The breadth of these use cases reflects the wider transformation occurring in Tanzania.
Mobile money is evolving from a transfer service into a financial ecosystem.
Tanzanians Are Increasingly Paying Businesses Digitally
One of the most commercially important changes is the growth of consumer-to-business payments.
The Bank of Tanzania recorded approximately 2.30 billion payment-to-business transactions worth TZS 37.5 trillion in 2025. Transaction volumes increased by 30.4% and values by 41.0% compared with the previous year.
The number of merchants accepting digital payments also rose substantially—from approximately 1.33 million in 2024 to 2.79 million in 2025.
Chart 2: The expansion of digital merchant acceptance. Source: Bank of Tanzania.
This matters far beyond mobile operators.
It matters to retailers, supermarkets, restaurants, transport providers, pharmacies, wholesalers, schools, utilities, e-commerce companies and SMEs.
A business that understands how its customers prefer to pay can reduce transaction friction at the point of purchase.
But Tanzania Is Not Cashless Yet
The growth figures should not be interpreted as meaning cash has disappeared.
The relationship between cash and mobile money remains complex.
A customer may receive money digitally and immediately withdraw it.
A small trader may accept mobile money but later cash out to pay suppliers.
Consumers may use digital payments in one situation and prefer cash in another.
Earlier World Bank analysis of Tanzania's merchant-payment market found that digital merchant-payment adoption had grown, but identified continued challenges around awareness, costs, customer experience and the value proposition for merchants.
More recent Bank of Tanzania evidence also indicates that merchant acceptance remains more concentrated in major towns, suggesting that digitalisation is still geographically uneven.
This creates a useful distinction:
Mobile-money access is widespread. Fully digital financial behaviour is still evolving.
The Agent Still Matters in a Digital Economy
One of the interesting features of mobile money is that a digital financial system continues to depend heavily on physical infrastructure.
Tanzania's approximately 1.98 million mobile-money agents provide the bridge between cash and electronic value.
For many customers, therefore, the quality of the mobile-money experience may depend as much on the nearest agent as on the technology behind the wallet.
Is an agent nearby?
Is the agent open?
Is enough cash available for withdrawal?
Can the customer deposit the required amount?
Can a transaction problem be resolved?
TSMR's research specifically examined the ease of finding points of service and the availability of cash or electronic value at those points, recognising that access and liquidity can influence provider choice.
Infographic 3: Mobile money may be digital, but physical access, agent liquidity and merchant acceptance remain critical parts of the customer experience.
USSD Is Not Dead—and Apps Are Not the Whole Market
Another important business lesson is not to assume that digital transformation means app-only.
TSMR's questionnaire deliberately examined whether consumers conducted mobile-money transactions through a provider's application, USSD codes, a combination of the two, QR codes or other applications. It also explored whether choices were driven by speed, ease of use and practicality.
This is particularly relevant given Tanzania's device landscape.
The Bank of Tanzania, citing sector statistics, reported smartphone penetration of approximately 41.8% in 2025, while feature-phone penetration remained much higher at about 87.1%.
For businesses, the implication is straightforward:
Digital does not automatically mean smartphone application.
Solutions designed for the Tanzanian mass market may need to work across different levels of device ownership, connectivity and digital literacy.
Infographic 4: Different technology. Same customer need: simple, reliable transactions.
Mobile Money Is Connecting Banks and Wallets
The boundary between mobile money and conventional banking is also becoming less distinct.
In 2025, wallet-to-bank transactions reached approximately 15.45 million transactions worth TZS 5.36 trillion, while bank-to-wallet transfers reached approximately 127.3 million transactions worth TZS 17.27 trillion.
This integration means consumers increasingly operate within a financial ecosystem rather than choosing strictly between “banked” and “mobile-money user.”
A salary may enter through a bank.
Money may move to a mobile wallet.
A bill may then be paid digitally.
Another portion may be transferred to a relative.
Some may eventually be saved or used to service digital credit.
Infographic 5: The connected Tanzanian financial journey.
This is where financial institutions, fintechs and telecommunications companies increasingly intersect.
From Wallet to Savings and Credit
Perhaps one of the strongest signals about the future of mobile money is the growth of financial services delivered through digital channels.
The Bank of Tanzania reports that the volume of digital savings transactions increased from 46.47 million in 2024 to 97.53 million in 2025, while their value increased from approximately TZS 1.21 trillion to TZS 3.18 trillion.
Digital credit also expanded, reaching approximately 336.5 million transactions worth TZS 5.58 trillion in 2025.
Chart 3: Digital finance is moving beyond payments. Source: Bank of Tanzania.
This raises an important strategic question:
What will Tanzanians expect their mobile wallets to do next?
The Next Competition May Be Around Financial Ecosystems
TSMR's study explored respondents' interest in potential mobile-money-linked services including:
small emergency loans, workplace accident microinsurance, health and hospital microinsurance, smartphone financing through instalments, and payments for digital entertainment services.
These questions point toward a much larger opportunity.
The future mobile-money relationship may extend through a customer's financial life:
Payments → Savings → Credit → Insurance → Commerce → Investment
Infographic 6: From mobile wallet to financial ecosystem.
Businesses should therefore stop thinking about mobile money only as a payment option.
It increasingly represents a platform through which financial relationships can be created.
Trust Will Determine How Far the Ecosystem Can Expand
The greater the financial role of mobile money, the more important trust becomes.
The TSMR study examined security and trust as provider-selection factors and explicitly included fraud, scams and security breaches among potential reasons why consumers might change their main mobile-money provider.
This becomes increasingly important when customers move from making small transfers to:
storing money, receiving salaries, borrowing, saving, paying businesses or purchasing insurance.
The value proposition therefore needs to combine:
Convenience + Affordability + Availability + Security + Reliability
A failure in any one of these dimensions can affect the entire customer relationship.
What Does This Mean for Businesses?
For businesses operating or investing in Tanzania, five conclusions stand out.
First, mobile money should be considered part of the country's commercial infrastructure, not simply another payment method.
Second, registration is not the same as loyalty. Consumers can operate across multiple providers and select wallets according to price, network, agent access, convenience or use case.
Third, payment behaviour is becoming more sophisticated. The same customer may transfer money, pay merchants, move funds between a bank and wallet, save digitally and access credit.
Fourth, physical and digital channels need to work together. Apps and QR payments are growing, but agents, USSD and feature phones remain important.
Fifth, the next opportunity is likely to be ecosystem-based. Businesses able to connect payments with commerce, savings, credit, insurance and other relevant services may find opportunities beyond the transaction itself.
From Access to Everyday Financial Behaviour
TSMR Framework: The Mobile-Money Value Journey.
The next stage of Tanzania's mobile-money story may therefore be less about whether Tanzanians have access to mobile money and more about how deeply mobile money becomes embedded in their financial lives.
For businesses, that distinction is critical.
The question is no longer simply:
“Do Tanzanians use mobile money?”
The scale of the market has already answered that.
The more valuable questions are:
How do they use it?
What makes them choose one provider or channel over another?
When do they still choose cash?
Which financial services are they willing to access through their wallets?
And ultimately:
Where can businesses create genuine value within that financial journey?
