Nigeria's Metering Rate Reaches 63%, Unmetered Customers Drop to 4.7 Million

Nigeria's electricity metering rate climbed slightly to 63.1 percent in August 2026. This is up from 62.4 percent in July. The increase has brought the number of customers without meters down to 4.7 million. This data comes from the metering factsheet released by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) on Wednesday.

The number of metered customers went up from 7,903,819 in July to 8,045,565 in August. This represents a 1.8 percent rise, according to the data.

But the number of new metered customers dropped during this time. It fell from 159,980 in July to 141,746 in August.

These figures show that while the total number of metered customers is increasing, new installations slowed down in August.

The total active electricity customers in Nigeria also grew. It rose from 12,671,795 in July to 12,749,789 in August. This is a 0.6 percent increase, adding 77,994 customers in one month.

Estimated billing has been a big problem in Nigeria for years. Many registered electricity customers still do not have prepaid meters. This forces electricity companies to use estimates instead of actual usage to calculate bills.

On top of this, poor power supply caused by bad infrastructure and frequent grid failures makes it hard to provide reliable electricity.

Joseph Tegbe, the Minister of Power, promised to focus on improving power distribution, metering, transparency, and local participation. He made this pledge after he was appointed in June.

A look at the performance of the 11 electricity distribution companies (DisCos) shows big differences in their metering rates.

Eko Electricity Distribution Company had the highest metering rate at 89.6 percent in August. This is up from 89.3 percent in July.

Ikeja Electric was next with a metering rate of 87.7 percent, slightly down from 87.9 percent the month before.

Abuja Electricity Distribution Company saw its metering rate rise to 82.6 percent in August, up from 82 percent in July.

Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution Company also improved its rate to 71 percent in August from 69.6 percent in July.

Benin DisCo's metering rate increased from 63.2 percent to 64.4 percent. Ibadan DisCo went up from 58.6 percent to 59.2 percent.

Enugu DisCo recorded a metering rate of 52.4 percent, slightly up from 52.1 percent in July.

The factsheet highlighted that Jos DisCo had the lowest metering rate in August at 37.6 percent, up from 36.5 percent in July.

Yola DisCo was next at 39.2 percent, up from 37.8 percent. Kaduna DisCo's rate rose to 42.3 percent from 41.3 percent in July. Kano DisCo's rate also increased from 41.6 percent to 42.8 percent.

These low rates mean many customers still do not have meters from these companies.

The August numbers show that Nigeria's electricity metering coverage is improving, but the progress is not the same across all distribution companies.

While Eko, Ikeja, and Abuja have metered over 80 percent of their customers, Jos, Yola, Kaduna, and Kano are still below 43 percent.

The rise in metered customers along with the increase in active customers shows that distribution companies need to keep working on installations to close the metering gap.