Virgin Media O2 is seeing a mass customer exodus – and the company expects 2026 to get worse
Telecoms giant Virgin Media O2 is losing customers in droves, with nearly 400,000 mobile subscribers fleeing the network last year.
As the company braces for even rockier times ahead, experts warn this could signal broader discontent in the UK’s fiercely competitive broadband and mobile market.
The telecoms behemoth, formed from a £31 billion merger between Virgin Media and O2 in 2021, reported a net loss of 397,500 mobile customers in 2025, including a staggering 164,800 departures in Q4 alone.
Executives pinned much of the blame on O2’s recent price adjustments, which have left many users feeling squeezed amid the ongoing cost-of-living pressures.
This exodus comes hot on the heels of Virgin Media O2’s October announcement of a £2.50 monthly hike for its 15.6 million mobile customers, set to kick in from spring 2026—up from an earlier floated increase of £1.80.
For broadband users, the pain is compounded by an impending rise tied to the Retail Prices Index (RPI) inflation rate of 7.7% plus an additional 3.9%, potentially adding up to £4 a month to bills for some packages.
Financially, the hits keep coming. The company saw underlying earnings dip 0.4% to £3.9 billion for the year, with a sharper 2.4% decline in the last quarter. Excluding the recent merger with business-to-business provider Daisy – which created O2 Daisy, a £1.4 billion sales powerhouse, full-year earnings edged up 0.9%, but still fell 1.3% in Q4.
Dark clouds
Looking ahead, Virgin Media O2 isn’t optimistic. It forecasts a 3% to 5% drop in underlying earnings and total service revenues for 2026 (excluding the merger), citing “heightened promotional intensity,” uncertainty in the consumer fixed market, and efforts to streamline its business-to-business offerings.
“While we expect challenging market conditions to continue in 2026, we are well positioned to seize the right opportunities in each of our business areas – consumer, business-to-business and wholesale – and the foundations we’re putting in place today will help to build long-term customer trust and fuel future profitability and cash generation,” said CEO Lutz Schuler.
Rivals like BT, EE, TalkTalk, and Vodafone have also rolled out above-inflation hikes of 14% to 17% in recent years, drawing fire from consumer advocates, but few are seeing the same level of exodus.
