Surfshark’s Digital Quality of Life Index (DQL) 2024 ranks Ghana 88th in the world. The study indicates how well the country is performing in terms of overall digital well-being compared to other nations.
Ghana rises by eight places from last year, which reflects a commitment to developing the digital landscape and positioning the country as a leader in leveraging technological advancements to improve citizens’ quality of life.
“In an election year like 2024, where the digital realm shaped political discourse and societal values, prioritizing digital quality of life proved to be more important than ever.
It helps to ensure informed citizens, protect democratic processes, and foster innovation. Our annual project helps to better understand where each county stands in terms of the digital divide, highlighting where a nation’s digital quality of life excels and where further focus is required,” says Tomas Stamulis, Surfshark’s Chief Security Officer.
Out of the Index’s five pillars, Ghana performed best in e-security, claiming 62nd place, but faced challenges in internet affordability, ranking 100th. The nation ranks 90th in e-infrastructure, 96th in e-government, and 99th in internet quality.
In the overall Index, Ghana surpasses the Ivory Coast (94th) and Nigeria (100th). Collectively, African countries lag in their digital quality of life, Ghana taking 6th place in the region.
Ghana ranks lower in e-government than 79% of the countries analyzed, with 95 countries above.
E-government determines how advanced and digitized a country’s government services are. A well-developed e-government helps minimize bureaucracy, reduce corruption, and increase transparency within the public sector.
This pillar also shows the level of Artificial Intelligence (AI) readiness a country demonstrates. Countries with the highest readiness to adopt AI technology are also ready to counter national cyber threats. Ghana ranks 96th in the world in e-government — seven places lower than last year.
Ghana is 62nd in the world in e-security — twenty-one places higher than last year.
The e-security pillar measures how well a country is prepared to counter cybercrime and how advanced a country’s data protection laws are. In this pillar, Ghana outperforms the Ivory Coast (67th) and Nigeria (76th). Ghana is unprepared to fight against cybercrime, but the country has some data protection laws.
Ghana’s internet quality is 23% lower than the global average.
- Ghana’s fixed internet averages 70Mbps. To put that into perspective, the world’s fastest fixed internet — Singapore’s — is 347Mbps. Meanwhile, the slowest fixed internet in the world — Tunisia’s — is 14 Mbps.
- Ghana’s mobile internet averages 25 Mbps. The fastest mobile internet — the UAE’s — is 430Mbps, while the world’s slowest mobile internet — Yemen’s — is 12Mbps.
Compared to Ivory Coast, Ghana’s mobile internet is 44% slower, while fixed broadband is 29% slower. Since last year, mobile internet speed in Ghana has improved by 69%, while fixed broadband speed has grown by 20%.
The internet is unaffordable in Ghana compared to other countries.
Ghanaians have to work 14 hours 19 minutes a month to afford fixed broadband internet. It is 61 times more than in Bulgaria, which has the world’s most affordable fixed internet (Bulgarians have to work 14 minutes a month to afford it).
Ghanaians have to work 2 hours 1 minute 22 seconds a month to afford mobile internet. This is 13 times more than in Angola, which has the world’s most affordable mobile internet (Angolans have to work 9 minutes a month to afford it).
Ghana is 90th in e-infrastructure.
Advanced e-infrastructure makes it easy for people to use the internet for various daily activities, such as working, studying, shopping, etc. This pillar evaluates how high internet penetration is in a given country, as well as its network readiness (readiness to take advantage of Information and Communication Technologies). Ghana’s internet penetration is moderate (70% % — 89th in the world), and the country ranks 95th in network readiness.
On a global scale, investing in e-government and e-infrastructure improves digital well-being the most.
Among the five pillars, e-government has the strongest correlation with the DQL index (0.92), followed by e-infrastructure (0.91); Internet affordability shows the weakest correlation at 0.65.
METHODOLOGY
The DQL Index 2024 examines 121 nations based on five core pillars that consist of 14 indicators. The study is based on the United Nations’ open-source information, the World Bank, and other sources. Ghana’s full profile in the 2024 Digital Quality of Life report and an interactive country comparison tool can be found here: https://surfshark.com/research/dql/country/GH.
