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- A message from the past: due to Internet outages in Russia, SMS messages have become more frequent
A message from the past: due to Internet outages in Russia, SMS messages have become more frequent
Citizens and organizations in the Russian Federation began to send each other more SMS messages — in the summer of this year, the traffic of such messages, which has been steadily falling since the early 2010s, increased by 12-15%, market participants told Izvestia. They cite the increased frequency of mobile Internet outages as the reason for the growing popularity of outdated cellular technology. Companies use SMS to send notifications and passwords, and citizens use it for regular correspondence when messengers are unavailable.
The rise in popularity of SMS: figures and reasons
Due to the constant outages of the mobile Internet in the early summer of 2025, the number of SMS messages increased, market participants told Izvestia. In June-July, compared to the beginning of the year, traffic increased by 12-15%, according to one of them. According to him, this applies to both service messages — authorization codes, information about payments and delivery of goods — and personal correspondence.
"The total number of outgoing SMS messages sent by our subscribers over the past six months has increased by an average of 15%," the MegaFon press service told Izvestia, comparing the middle of summer with the beginning of the year.
Daria Kolesnikova, a representative of T2, noted that in the first half of the year there was a stabilization and a slight increase (by 2%) in SMS newsletters for businesses, as well as in the exchange of messages between individuals (P2P).
"The increase in May—June partially offset the decrease, but did not reverse the trend: in the first half of the year, SMS traffic per user decreased by 3% year-on-year," she says.
The growth of SMS traffic does not mean that subscribers have rushed to send such messages to each other due to mobile Internet outages, a source close to one of the operators notes. According to him, the number of services that want to interact with customers via SMS is increasing.
— For example, payment for parking from a mobile phone account, when it is necessary to send a reply message to confirm the operation, and there are a lot of such services, — the Izvestia interlocutor notes.
Eldar Murtazin, a leading analyst at Mobile Research Group, confirms that SMS traffic is growing for the first time since 2013. According to him, the main reason is the disconnection of the mobile Internet, due to which push notifications do not work. In such circumstances, SMS messages become the only reliable communication channel for banks and other services.
Companies are already responding to customer problems with internet access. For example, at the end of May, the logistics operator DPD launched an option that allows you to send delivery notifications only via SMS, without using messengers. According to a company representative, this information comes instantly, even with a weak signal. In June, more than a thousand customers turned on the option, which helped to halve the number of product returns. Currently, SMS accounts for 53% of all operator's client notifications.
Izvestia sent a request to the Ministry of Finance.
Not only SMS: what other means of communication do Russians choose
Active use of SMS is not the only way to adapt to mobile Internet outages. This method is one of the ways to deal with drones attacking various objects. In this regard, citizens and businesses are turning to alternative solutions.
So, as Izvestia reported, Russians began to buy routers for home Internet more often. The demand for these devices doubled in June and July compared to the same period in 2024. Rostelecom noted that in recent months, the number of applications for home Internet connection has increased by an average of 12-15% year-on-year. In the business segment, demand was even higher: in June and July, the number of applications from small and medium-sized enterprises for fixed Internet connection increased 2.2 times. Such clients need it to connect their information systems, cash registers and distribute the Internet to visitors, the company said. Authorities and businesses are currently discussing the introduction of rules to streamline such communication restrictions.
— Due to frequent outages of the mobile Internet, the demand for "half-forgotten" technologies such as SMS and Wi—Fi in public places has increased, - said Konstantin Ankilov, CEO of TMT Consulting. — They are still in great demand when working with banks, websites, and state portals; for example, when logging in, obtaining passwords, and in other situations, this area continues to develop.
At the same time, he noted that personal SMS correspondence had almost disappeared. According to him, SMS traffic has fallen by more than eight times over the past 10 years, and 2025 is the first period when such messages have become relevant again.
ComNews Research partner Leonid Konik identifies two segments of the SMS market: messages exchanged by individuals (P2P) and commercial mailings from banks, retailers and other companies (A2P).
— The first segment in Russia has been relatively stable in recent years, accounting for 15-16 billion outgoing messages per year. But the A2P segment has seen ups and downs in Russia: in 2014, this market collapsed to 24 billion SMS messages (from 69 billion in 2013), and then gradually gained momentum and since 2017 has been leaving about 40-45 billion commercial messages per year," he said.
According to him, the recent increase in the number of SMS messages is due to two factors. The first is the transition of private subscribers to traditional messages when the mobile Internet is unavailable. The second is the increase in the number of companies using two—factor authentication to log into personal accounts on websites and applications, as well as to access corporate information systems.
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