Colombo (AsiaNews) – Only 21.3 per cent of households in Sri Lanka own a desktop or laptop computer, a persistent state of backwardness regarding digital development and the use of computing technology in daily life, even within the home, this according to the Computer Literacy Statistics 2025 bulletin released by the Department of Census and Statistics (DCS).
The study, based on a nationally representative sample of 25,000 households and individuals aged between five and 69, once again confirms a significant gap in access to personal computing devices.
At 39.2 per cent, the overall computer literacy rate marks an increase of 3.3 percentage points over 2024.
The survey defines a computer literate person as an individual aged between five and 69 who is capable of using a computer independently.
The DCS has been conducting periodic surveys on computer literacy since 2004, and since 2014, its studies have included a specific integrated module linked to the Sri Lanka Labour Force Survey.
According to the DCS, while 37.8 per cent of households in the urban sector had a desktop or laptop, the figure fell to 18.6 per cent in the rural sector and just 5.2 per cent in the estate sector. This means that computer ownership among estate households was less than one seventh of the level recorded in urban households.
Significant interprovincial differences were also noted. The Western Province recorded the highest proportion of households equipped with a desktop or laptop (34 per cent), followed by the Central Province (20.3 per cent) and Sabaragamuwa Province (19.4 per cent).
The North-Western and Southern provinces recorded 17.5 per cent and 17.4 per cent respectively, while Uva Province stood at 14.1 per cent. The North-Central Province recorded 12.9 per cent, followed by the Eastern Province with 12.5 per cent; the Northern Province recorded the lowest level of household computer ownership (10.1 per cent).
The study found that the percentage of households with a desktop or laptop computer remained within the 19–21 per cent range during the 2023–2025 period, this despite a substantially higher level of digital literacy in the country.
In fact, the report found that, in 2025, about 72 per cent of people aged between five and 69 were considered “digitally literate” compared to a computer literacy rate of 39.2 per cent.
This gap indicates that digital access is increasingly occurring via mobile devices rather than traditional personal computers. Indeed, smartphones accounted for 80.6 per cent of device usage recorded in the survey, while desktop and laptop computers made up 17.4 per cent.
IT experts Thushari Amarasekara and Anuradha Malalasekera told AsiaNews that digital literacy among children five to nine “rose to 56.5 per cent by the end of 2025, up from 48.3 per cent” a year earlier.
Young people aged 20 to 24 have held the lead in digital literacy since the end of 2024. Their “digital literacy is near saturation, at 94.5 per cent” in the first half of 2025, up from to 93.7 per cent at the end of 2024.
Digital literacy among young people aged 15 to 19 is also up, the IT specialists noted, “from 91.6 per cent to 93.6 per cent during the period under review”, while the 25–29 age group ranked “third at 91.4 per cent, up from 90.5 per cent in 2024.”
Finally, a joint study by several leading universities found that smartphone use by Sri Lankans aged five to 69 to access the Internet or send and receiving emails fell to 79.7 per cent at the end of the first half of last year, compared to the 80.3 per cent recorded at the end of 2024.
Women, who are the main users of smartphones for Internet access and email are behind “the drop from 81.2 per cent to 80.7 per cent during the period in question,” especially those who are unemployed. Conversely, usage among men, rose slightly, “from 79.4 per cent to 79.7 per cent over the same period.”
