Icasa data confirms scale of South Africa's pay-TV collapse

number of Pay-TV subscribers in South Africa fell below seven million for the first time in at least five years, falling 9.6% from 7.4 million to 6.7 million by September 2025, according to communications regulator Icasa's latest ICT sector report.

The decline has added to the subscriber crisis amid harsh regulatory data that has forced new owner Canal+ from MultiChoice Group to undertake a strategic reset on DStv, including scrapping annual price increases and Shutdown of Showmax streaming platform.

Over the five-year period from 2021 to 2025, pay-TV subscriptions declined at a compound annual rate of 5.2%, from 8.3 million to 6.7 million – a loss of 1.6 million subscribers.

Icasa attributed the decline to “the rapid growth of over-the-top streaming services, which make content available on-demand via the Internet, allowing viewers greater flexibility than traditional pay TV”, as well as rising costs and economic pressures on consumers.

Total broadcasting revenues, which also include radio, fell 4.6% to R33-billion. Subscription revenue of R24.5-billion remains the leading income source, accounting for about three-quarters of the total, followed by advertising at R6-billion.

However, program expenditure continued to increase, increasing by 7.6% from R16-billion to R17.2-billion. Local independent production expenditure reached R1.2 billion. Broadcasters are spending more on content even as their audiences and revenues are declining – a pattern that cannot be sustained indefinitely.

'stop the bleeding'

Icasa data covers the period to September 2025, which includes the period before Canal+ completes the acquisition of MultiChoice and takes operational control. Customer trajectory has been a central concern for the new ownership.

In An interview with TechCentral in FebruaryMultiChoice Group CEO david mignot Recognizing the gravity of the crisis, he set out his mandate thus: “Stop the bleeding, return to development.”

Reading: MultiChoice pulls the plug on Showmax

Mignot Confirmed MultiChoice will not raise DStv prices in April – breaking the long-standing tradition of annual increases – arguing that it was “not exactly the right time for a price increase” while the company was trying to rebuild its customer base. He pointed to Canal+'s experience in French-speaking Africa, where pricing has remained almost stable for 14 years while the number of subscribers has grown from 500,000 to eight million.

MultiChoice lost 2.8 million linear broadcast subscribers in the two years to 31 March 2025, with almost half of the losses occurring in South Africa alone.

Canal+ is since stop showmaxWhat Mignot described as a platform that was “not flying” financially, and is targeting €250 million in synergy gains across the combined group.

Icasa itself has indicated a regulatory response, recommending “comprehensive market investigation of OTT communications and streaming services to assess their competitive impact on the ICT sector”. A government draft white paper published in 2025 proposes that licensing obligations could apply to global streaming platforms once revenue thresholds are met.

Reading: MultiChoice cancels annual DStv price hike

The challenge for regulators and incumbents alike is that the market is moving faster than policy can respond. While pay-TV lost 700,000 subscribers in a single year, fixed broadband – the infrastructure that enables streaming – grew 19.3% to 3.26 million connections, with fibre-to-the-home subscriptions topping three million for the first time. — © 2026 NewsCentral Media