Nigeria’s headline inflation rate rose to 15.69 per cent in April 2026, from 15.38 per cent recorded in March 2026, as the surge in food, transport, hospitality, and healthcare costs pushed up consumer prices nationwide. The National Bureau of Statistics disclosed this in its Consumer Price Index report released on Friday.
According to the report, “In April 2026, the Headline inflation rate rose to 15.69 per cent, up from 15.38 per cent in March 2026 and stood at 26.82 per cent in the same month of the preceding year (April 2025). Looking at the movement, the April 2026 Headline inflation rate showed an increase of 0.31 per cent compared to the March 2026 Headline inflation rate.” The bureau stated that the Consumer Price Index increased to 138.3 in April 2026, representing a 2.9-point rise from the 135.4 recorded in March.
Despite the increase in annual inflation, the report showed that the pace of monthly price growth slowed in April. On a month-on-month basis, headline inflation stood at 2.13 per cent, lower than the 4.18 per cent recorded in March. The NBS explained, “This means that in April 2026, the rate of increase in the average price level was lower than the rate of increase in the average price level in March 2026.” Food and non-alcoholic beverages remained the largest contributor to headline inflation, accounting for 6.40 percentage points of the overall rate.
Restaurants and accommodation services contributed 3.56 percentage points, while transport accounted for 1.70 percentage points. Health contributed 1.21 percentage points, followed by housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels at 0.77 percentage points. Other contributors included personal care and miscellaneous goods and services at 0.64 percentage points, education services at 0.49 percentage points, clothing and footwear at 0.32 percentage points, and information and communication at 0.28 percentage points.
The report further showed that the percentage change in the average CPI for the 12 months ending April 2026 was 19.16 per cent, slightly lower than the 19.33 per cent recorded in April 2025. On urban inflation, the bureau said the year-on-year rate stood at 15.40 per cent in April 2026, while the month-on-month rate slowed to 1.86 per cent from 3.16 per cent in March.
For rural inflation, the NBS said the year-on-year rate was higher at 16.36 per cent, while the month-on-month rate eased to 2.80 per cent from 6.73 per cent in March. Food inflation also increased on a yearly basis. The report stated that food inflation stood at 16.06 per cent in April 2026, compared to 24.68 per cent in April 2025.
On a monthly basis, however, food inflation slowed to 3.63 per cent from 4.17 per cent in March. Related News You can't demand development without paying tax, says Tinubu Food, transport costs drive inflation to 15.69% in April Farmers call for more investment in cocoa processing The bureau attributed the rise in food prices to increases in the prices of staple items, including millet, yam flour, fresh ginger, beef, garri, yam tubers, fresh pepper, crayfish, cassava tubers, beans, Irish potatoes, tomatoes, wheat grain, soybeans, guinea corn, plantain, and carrots.
According to the report, “The average annual rate of Food inflation for the twelve months ending April 2026, relative to the previous twelve-month average, was 17.55 per cent, which was 17.05 percentage points lower than the average annual rate of change recorded in April 2025 (34.60 per cent).” Core inflation, which excludes volatile agricultural produce and energy prices, stood at 15.86 per cent year-on-year in April 2026, lower than the 26.05 per cent recorded in April 2025.
On a monthly basis, core inflation slowed sharply to 1.03 per cent from 4.03 per cent in March. The report also showed that farm produce inflation rose by 19.8 per cent year-on-year and six per cent month-on-month, while energy inflation recorded 4.6 per cent annual growth and eight per cent monthly growth.
Services inflation stood at 16.7 per cent year-on-year and 2.1 per cent month-on-month, while goods inflation was 15.7 per cent annually and 3.2 per cent monthly. Imported food inflation stood at 10.5 per cent year-on-year and 4.4 per cent month-on-month. At the state level, Sokoto recorded the highest year-on-year all-items inflation rate at 25.74 per cent, followed by Bauchi at 22.52 per cent and Zamfara at 22.03 per cent.