How much money Virgin Media O2 makes from each UK subscriber
Key Points
- Virgin Media O2 reported monthly ARPU of £46.50 per UK broadband home in Q1 2026, down 1.6% year-over-year, equivalent to £558 a year per customer
- Monthly ARPU per consumer mobile contract held broadly stable at £17.21 against £17.25 a year earlier, equivalent to £206.52 a year per line
- Virgin Media O2 serves 5.5 million UK consumer broadband customers and 12.5 million consumer mobile contract subscribers
- Consumer fixed-line losses narrowed to 6,900 in Q1 2026 from 44,700 a year earlier, with Virgin Media broadband complaints down 42% year-over-year per Ofcom
- ARPU declines reflect sustained promotional intensity across UK broadband as rival providers and full fibre challengers compete on price
Virgin Media O2 has published its Q1 results to 31 March 2026, showing how much money it makes per user, known as the Average Revenue Per User (ARPU).
Virgin Media O2 takes £46.50 a month from each broadband home and £17.21 from each mobile contract customer, Q1 2026 results show.
Figures published on Friday (1 May) reveal monthly ARPU per consumer fixed-line customer eased 1.6% year-over-year to £46.50, while monthly ARPU per consumer mobile contract connection slipped just 4p to £17.21.
Annualised, that works out at £558 per broadband household and £206.52 per mobile contract subscriber, with Virgin Media O2 serving 5.5 million consumer fixed-line customers and 12.5 million consumer mobile contract subscribers across the UK.
The fixed-line drop reflects sustained promotional intensity across UK broadband, with rival providers including Vodafone, EE, Sky, BT and TalkTalk running aggressive switching offers and full fibre challengers such as CommunityFibre and Hyperoptic undercutting incumbent pricing in urban areas.
Virgin Media also reported a 42% year-over-year drop in Ofcom broadband complaints and consumer fixed-line losses narrowing to 6,900 from 44,700 in the same quarter last year, suggesting customer retention is improving even as ARPU softens.
Mobile pricing held broadly stable, with consumer ARPU at £17.21 against £17.25 a year earlier.
Consumer contract churn reduced as expected during the quarter, despite contract losses of 37,600 in the consumer segment as customers shopped a wider mobile market that includes EE, Three and MVNOs such as Smarty, Tesco Mobile and giffgaff, several of which run on the O2 network itself.
Total consumer revenue reached £1,813.7 million for the quarter, down 3.8% year-over-year, with consumer fixed service revenue of £772.0 million and consumer mobile service revenue of £775.2 million each contributing roughly equally.
Average pricing matters to UK households in two ways. A lower ARPU often signals competitive pricing for switchers and renegotiators, but it can also point to tighter operator margins that may eventually feed into reduced customer service investment or future price rises.
For wider context, Virgin Media O2’s £558 annual broadband spend per household sits within typical UK broadband bills, with Ofcom data showing households spending between £28 and £55 per month on broadband depending on speed tier and provider.
Mobile contract spend at around £17 a month is lower than average UK pay-monthly bills, reflecting the shift towards SIM-only deals and the maturity of the contract market.
