Nigeria Public Debt
₦153.29 Trillion — Q3 2025
Nigeria's total public debt stood at ₦153.29 trillion (US$103.94 billion) at the end of Q3 2025 — up 0.59% from Q2. Domestic debt accounts for 53.4% of the total.
Total Public Debt
₦153.3tn
Q3 2025
In USD
$103.9bn
at Q3 2025 exchange rate
Domestic Debt
₦81.8tn
53.4% of total
External Debt
₦71.5tn
46.6% of total
Debt Composition — Q3 2025
QoQ Change (Q2 → Q3 2025)
+₦0.89 trillion (+0.59%)
Selected State Domestic Debt — Q3 2025 (₦bn)
Lagos alone carries ₦1.045 trillion — almost 3x the next highest state.
Editor's Insight
What ₦153 trillion in debt means for Nigeria
₦153 trillion — Nigeria's debt in context
Nigeria's total public debt at ₦153.29 trillion (~$104bn) sounds enormous. But debt-to-GDP ratio matters more than the raw number. Nigeria's debt-to-GDP remains below 50% — low by African standards. The real problem is debt servicing: Nigeria spends over 90% of revenue on debt service, leaving almost nothing for infrastructure and services.
Naira devaluation inflated the debt figure dramatically
A large part of Nigeria's debt surge in naira terms is FX-driven, not new borrowing. When the naira weakened from ~₦460/$ to ~₦1,500/$, every dollar of external debt tripled in naira value. The 46.6% external debt share means that further naira weakness automatically increases total debt without taking on a single new loan.
Lagos accounts for a quarter of all state domestic debt
Lagos's ₦1.045 trillion state debt dwarfs every other state. But Lagos also generates far more internally generated revenue than any other state — meaning its debt is more serviceable than the numbers alone suggest. In contrast, some smaller states carry debt multiples of their annual IGR, creating genuine fiscal stress.
Slow QoQ growth (0.59%) is actually progress
Total debt grew just 0.59% from Q2 to Q3 2025 — the slowest quarterly increase in years. This reflects fiscal consolidation efforts and reduced new borrowing. Whether this pace holds depends heavily on the 2026 budget deficit and whether the Federal Government continues to resist pressure for new Eurobond issuances.
About this data
Data sourced from the Debt Management Office (DMO) Nigeria Q3 2025 Public Debt Report, as published by the National Bureau of Statistics. Figures represent total public debt stock including Federal Government and State Government obligations. Figures.ng republishes official data for every Nigerian.