KARACHI: Pakistan’s mobile phone imports rose sharply during the first five months of the current fiscal year, even as State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) data shows significantly lower import payments due to the growing share of local assembly.
Official trade data shows mobile phone imports worth $801.14 million during July–November FY26, compared with $570.18 million in the same period last year, marking a growth of 40.51%. In rupee terms, the import bill increased to Rs226.13 billion from Rs158.52 billion, up 42.65%.
However, SBP import payment data for the same period paints a different picture. Payments made through the banking system for mobile phone imports amounted to $104.5 million during July–November FY26, highlighting the impact of local manufacturing and deferred or CKD-based imports. In November alone, SBP-recorded import payments stood at $25.12 million.
On a month-on-month basis, mobile phone imports increased by 8.30% to $156.57 million in November 2025, compared with $144.56 million in October. On a year-on-year basis, November imports declined by 4.81% from $149.38 million in November 2024.
During the previous fiscal year FY25, Pakistan imported mobile phones worth $1.49 billion, down 21.31% from $1.90 billion in FY24. In rupee terms, imports stood at Rs417.35 billion in FY25, compared with Rs535.69 billion a year earlier, reflecting a decline of 22.09%.
Overall telecom imports into Pakistan totaled $2.10 billion in FY25, registering a contraction of 11.30% compared with $2.37 billion in FY24.
At the same time, domestic mobile phone manufacturing continued to expand. Local assembling plants produced 25.11 million handsets during the first ten months of calendar year 2025, compared with 1.7 million units imported commercially over the same period.
In October 2025 alone, local manufacturers assembled 2.33 million mobile phones, while only around 0.2 million handsets were imported commercially. Of the locally assembled devices, 13.2 million were smartphones and 11.9 million were 2G phones.
According to Pakistan Telecommunication Authority data, smartphones account for about 70% of devices operating on local networks, while 2G phones make up the remaining 30%.
