The WBA Digital Inclusion Benchmark measures and ranks the world's most influential companies on their efforts to advance digital inclusion, tracking how companies are expanding access to digital technologies, improving digital skills and literacy, and ensuring safe and inclusive digital environments for all. The 2026 edition assessed 200 companies across key sectors of the digital economy including telecommunications, software, hardware, and digital platforms. The benchmark is developed in close collaboration with an Expert Review Committee and partners including GRI, ITU, and the Alliance for Affordable Internet, with a methodology designed to incentivise companies to understand where digital exclusion risks are highest and act to bridge the digital divide, while keeping human rights and social impacts at its core.
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SDG target 9.c calls for universal and affordable access to the Internet. Additionally, the Global Digital Compact calls for increasing the availability and affordability of digital technologies for an inclusive, open, sustainable, fair, safe and secure digital future for all.xi Yet the world remains far from achieving this target. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) estimates that 33% of the world’s population – around 2.6 billion people – was still offline in 2023.xii Most of these people reside in low- and middle-income countries, while those who lack digital access in high-income countries are mainly vulnerable groups, such as ethnic minorities, people with disabilities and elderly people.
Company best practices for this indicator involve measurable actions to help those lacking digital access get and stay connected. In the case of telecommunication companies, this could involve offering reduced connectivity prices for those with low incomes. Similarly, hardware companies might provide subsidised devices, enabling digital access for disadvantaged people. Participation in open, vendor-neutral initiatives to lower deployment costs in remote and rural areas is another example. These examples are illustrative, and companies may have other ways in which they support the goal of improving availability and affordability of digital technologies.
Research Guidance:
The company provides evidence that it advances digital access for vulnerable groups specifically through infrastructure build-out, affordability initiatives, or provision of devices, and does so with durable resourcing and governance (e.g., multi-year funding, ongoing delivery, mechanisms for scale).
To meet this element, the company must provide evidence of one or more of the following:
- evidence that digital access is not treated as a short-term commitment or ad hoc issue, but rather as a core area of sustained social investment;
- evidence of having more than one programme running to support digital access;
- evidence of a multi-year roadmap and dedicated multi-year funding for supporting digital access for vulnerable groups.