Websites you can access without data in South Africa

The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) recently published new regulations stipulating that mobile operators must zero-rate content from public benefit organisations (PBOs). This adds to the list of zero-rated websites in South Africa.

Icasa’s new regulations require all mobile network operators that successfully bid during the 2022 spectrum auction to allow PBOs to provide zero-rated content.

Zero-rated websites are freely available to access without consuming a user’s mobile data.

PBOs include non-profit organisations, government departments with .gov.za domains, and trusts. PBOs must apply to Icasa to determine whether they qualify for zero-rating.

Successful bidders during the 2022 spectrum auction include Telkom, Liquid Telecom, Cell C, Rain, MTN, and Vodacom.

However, Cell C has forfeited its auction spectrum and is negotiating with Icase to secure its allocation again using a different process.

The remaining operators have 36 months from the date the spectrum licences were issued, 15 January 2024, to fulfil their zero-rating obligations.

It should be noted that zero-rated content has some restrictions, such as not allowing video streams at qualities higher than 480p.

The regulations also include a fair usage policy, under which users will be limited to 300MB of zero-rated data daily and 2GB per month per network provider.

Icasa specifies that mobile network operators are responsible for monitoring abuse, which they can then report to the regulator.

The Internet Service Providers Association (ISPA) previously maintained a list of websites that were zero-rated during the Covid-19 pandemic, but these obligations ended with the lifting of the National State of Disaster.

“Commendably, some operators did continue to voluntarily zero-rate the Covid list of sites after April 2022, but they have no obligation to do so,” ISPA told MyBroadband.

“The Covid list of sites is also no longer being maintained, so any technical changes to a site (e.g. a new IP address) may break any ongoing zero-rating.”

“This means that there is, unfortunately, no authoritative list of sites that South Africans can currently rely on to be zero-rated across operators,” it added.

ISPA said Icasa has started accepting applications from sites under the new framework, but they are yet to be zero-rated, and spectrum licence conditions will only force operators to do so from January 2027.

“It seems reasonable to assume that ICASA will publish a list of sites accepted for zero-rating at some point before then,” it added.

Thousands of zero-rated websites in South Africa

Mobile network operators in South Africa offer access to a range of zero-rated websites. Telkom previously told MyBroadband that over 1,000 websites are zero-rated on its network.

“This service allows the end consumer or customer of that business to access that specific URL or IP address for free without consuming data,” a spokesperson said.

They added that the zero-rated business customer is billed for the data usage.

“Telkom has been working in conjunction with ISPA and the Department of Communication and Digital Technologies to provide zero-rated access to selected educational websites since March 2020,” they said.

MTN zero-rates over 350 education, health, and employment websites through the MTN Foundation’s Open Time initiative.

The initiative requires users to register before they can access the zero-rated sites and to ensure fair usage, MTN applies a 500MB monthly data cap per user.

Once the 500MB cap is reached, MTN notes that standard data rates will apply while accessing the websites.

“You will need to re-activate, to gain access every 30 days or whenever you need to use the service after the 30 days has elapsed,” it states in its terms and conditions.

Vodacom said it zero-rates various government, education, health and wellness, and job portal websites through its ConnectU platform. It also supports a full zero-rated Internet function supported by Wikipedia.