Nigeria’s headline inflation rose to 15.15% in December 2025, a significant climb from the 14.45% recorded in November, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
While the month-on-month headline rate saw a 0.7% spike, the food sub-index offered a slight reprieve, dropping from 11.08% to 10.84%.
The NBS noted that this inflationary shift was primarily driven by a methodological adjustment following the recent rebasing of the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
“The Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose to 131.2 in December 2025, up by 0.7 points from the previous month (130.5),” the report stated.
The December 2025 year-on-year headline inflation rate stood at 15.15%, relative to the November 2025 headline inflation rate of 17.33%.
“The December 2025 year-on-year Headline inflation rate stood at 15.15% relative to the November 2025 headline inflation rate (17.33%).
“On a year-on-year basis, the December Headline inflation rate was 19.65% lower than the rate recorded in December 2024 (34.80%),” the report added.
This shows that the headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) decreased in December 2025 compared to the same month in the preceding year.
The NBS clarified that the December figures reflected a change in methodology, using a twelve-month index reference period with the average CPI for 2024 set to 100, rather than a single-month reference base.
“This shows that the Headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) decreased in December 2025 compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e., December 2024), though with a different base year, November 2009 = 100,” the report stated.
On a month-on-month basis, headline inflation moderated to 0.54% in December from 1.22% in November, indicating easing short-term price pressures.
The NBS attributed the change in methodology to align with international best practices under the IMF Consumer Price Index Manual and the ECOWAS Harmonised CPI framework.
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