Postal traffic falls by 6.9%

In the 4th quarter 2025, postal traffic in Portugal totalled 120.9 million items, down by 6.9% compared to the same quarter of 2024.

Postal traffic consisted of approximately 66.0% letter mail, 7.3% editorial mail, and 8.1 direct mail. Postal parcels represented 18.6% of total traffic, 0.9 percentage points (p.p.) more than in the 4th quarter of 2024.

Compared to the same period the previous year, letter mail, editorial mail and direct mail traffic declined by 7.9%, 10.7% and 4.6%, respectively, while parcel traffic decreased by 2.4%.

Average revenue per item increased compared to the same quarter the previous year (+7.5%), continuing the growth trend that began in 2018. The increase this quarter was mainly due to growth in unit revenue from parcels (up 3.1%) and letter mail (up 8.5%). The rise in unit revenue from letter mail was influenced by the price increases introduced by CTT on 1 February 2025.

Compared to the same quarter the previous year, letter mail revenue decreased by 0.1% and accounted for 46.9% of total postal revenue (-0.1 p.p. compared to the same quarter of 2024), while parcel revenue, which increased by 0.6%, accounted for 49.3% of total revenue (+0.3 p.p. compared to the same quarter of 2024).

Universal service (US) postal services accounted for 73.8% of traffic and 46.4% of revenue. Compared to 4Q2024, US traffic decreased by 8.5% and its weight in the total traffic decreased by 1.3 p.p., while US revenue decreased by 3.3% and its weight in the total decreased by 1.6 p.p.

Grupo CTT had a share of around 78.3% of postal traffic, 2.2 p.p. less than in the 4th quarter of 2024. As regards US traffic, Grupo CTT had a share of around 86.9%, 1.1 p.p. less than in the same quarter of 2024. On the other hand, Grupo CTT's share of parcels amounted to 41.9% (-2.6 p.p. compared to the 4th quarter of 2024).

In the 4th quarter of 2025, there were about 15.1 thousand employees involved in the operation of postal services, 1.1% more than in the 4th quarter of 2024. The number of employees of Grupo CTT decreased by 2.6%, while the number of employees of other operators increased by 9.0%. At the end of the period, the share of employees of Grupo CTT reached 65.2% of the total, -2.5 p.p. compared to the same quarter the previous year.

During the period under review, there was an increase in the number of access points (+2.7%) and vehicles (+4.7%), while the number of distribution centres remained the same year on year.

The number of CTT post offices decreased by 0.5% (-3 post offices) compared to the same quarter of 2024, while the number of post branches increased by 3.1% (+56 post branches).

Consult the statistical report:

• Postal services - 4th quarter 2025 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1829973