Nearly three-quarters of people over the age of 10 now own a mobile phone, potentially opening the way to broader internet use, the United Nations said.

The UN’s International Telecommunication Union has provided its first estimate of regional and global ownership, revealing that 73 percent of the world’s population over 10 years of age owned a cellphone in 2022.

But it cautioned that mobile phone ownership remains higher than internet use — especially in lower-income countries, with broadband usually more expensive than cellular-only services.

The ITU found that mobile phone ownership had grown steadily in recent years, estimating it had risen from under 67 percent in 2019.

The online population also saw a big bump in 2020 during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. (AFP)