Thanks to the Wayback Machine at the Internet Archive, we are able to track old Africa’s Internet statistics from Internet World Stats. Cached pages date back to August 2002. The historical data is useful in projecting future trends. For example, over the past 2 years, the Internet penetration rate in Africa has grown by approximately 1% annually. Although this number means 10 million more Africans have a means to the Internet every year, the Internet itself could be obsolete by the time 100% connectivity is achieved at this rate.

African Internet Users (in millions), 2000-2009. Source data: Internet Archive & IWS.

Percentage of Africans Online, 2002-2009. Source data: Internet Archive and Internet World Stats.

Notes:

• The number of Africans with Internet access rose sharply in mid-2005, mid-2007, and mid-2009, suggesting certain data is updated at this time every other year. The curve should be smoother.
• The rate of new African users has greatly increased since 2005 after modest gains since 2000.
• Africa’s rate of growth of Internet penetration is outpacing the world and has since 2005.
• In 2003, only 1% of Africans had a way to get online. Currently, this number stands at 6.7%.
• Africans now represent 4% of the world’s Internet users – up from 1.5% in 2004, but still a minute number based on population (Africa has 1/6 the world’s population).