Kenya's mobile money agent network has crossed the 500,000 mark for the first time, even as the cash volumes flowing through those agents continue to fall, according to data from the Central Bank of Kenya.
- •Active mobile money agents reached 507,383 in February 2026, up 28.5% from 394,853 in February 2025.
- •The network, which started with 307 agents when M-Pesa launched in March 2007, has taken seventeen years to reach this threshold, making it one of the largest financial distribution networks in Africa.
- •Transaction value through agents totaled KSh 633.35 billion in February 2026, a 19.8% decline from KSh 790.80 billion recorded in February 2024, the clearest like-for-like comparison.
Agents are the physical layer that makes digital money functional in a cash-dependent economy, handling cash-in and cash-out in markets where banks have limited physical presence. With mobile money subscription penetration now at 98% of Kenya's population and registered accounts reaching 91.32 million in February 2026, that access mission is largely complete.
Over the full calendar year 2025, agents handled approximately KSh 8.14 trillion, against KSh 8.70 trillion in 2024, a drop of roughly KSh 560 billion or 6.4%. Yet over the same period, the active agent count grew by nearly a quarter.
Rising smartphone penetration, now at 92.9% of connected devices per CA data, means more Kenyans are moving money directly between wallets without visiting an agent. Interoperability improvements and expanding bank digital rails are pulling further volume away from the agent channel, compressing per-agent earnings that are commission-based.
The expansion has moved in distinct phases. The first, from 2007 to 2015, was steep and exponential as M-Pesa grew from a peer-to-peer transfer service into the backbone of Kenya's informal economy. A second phase of moderate, predictable growth followed before the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020 introduced a break: CBK emergency fee waivers on low-value transactions pulled more agents into the network as transaction volumes surged.
The network then stagnated, hovering between 317,000 and 336,000 through 2022 and into early 2023, before a sharp acceleration from mid-2024 onward added more than 126,000 active agents in fourteen months to reach February's record.
Safaricom dominates the infrastructure underpinning this network. Communications Authority of Kenya data shows the company holds 89% of mobile money subscriptions, with its M-Pesa agent base forming the core of the 507,383 figure. Airtel Money, its closest competitor, operates approximately 150,000 agents.
