Nigerian students have done it again. For the third year in a row, Nigeria came out as the most successful country outside China at the Huawei ICT Competition Global Final, beating out teams from over 100 countries. The 2026 finals took place in Shenzhen, China, and pulled in more than 220,000 students and lecturers from over 2,000 universities worldwide. Out of all those entries, only 177 teams from 49 countries made it to the global finals, making this year’s contest the toughest in the competition’s history.
Nigeria sent a 15-member team made up of students from Ahmadu Bello University, University of Lagos, Federal University of Technology Minna, University of Port Harcourt, Nasarawa State University, and Igbinedion University. They competed in categories covering networking, cloud computing, general computing, and innovation. The country picked up two Grand Prizes, one in the Network Track and one in the Innovation Competition, with two more First Prizes in the Cloud Track and a Second Prize in Computing. Nigeria’s Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Bosun Tijani, confirmed the results and praised the students for representing the country well on a global stage.
The biggest standout came from Ahmadu Bello University. Their team built a solar powered device that can detect malaria and intestinal parasites in under three minutes, and it works completely without internet access. This matters a lot in Nigeria, where many rural clinics struggle with both unreliable power and poor internet connection. A diagnostic tool that skips both of those problems could be a real game changer for healthcare in hard to reach areas.
Tijani called the project a clear example of how young Nigerians can use technology to solve global level problems while still addressing issues close to home. He said plans are already in motion to connect the ABU team with more support so their idea can grow beyond the competition.
Nigeria was also recognised in the Women in Tech Award, which celebrated all-female teams from five countries including Nigeria, Kenya, China, Azerbaijan, and Bahrain. On top of that, Nigerian lecturers were named among the Most Valuable Instructors, an honour given to only 16 educators worldwide for their role in training ICT talent.
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The Huawei ICT Competition is part of a bigger programme called the Huawei ICT Academy, which started in 2015 to help universities train students in areas like AI, cloud computing, and cybersecurity. Today, it is one of the largest ICT talent programmes in the world and works closely with UNESCO’s Global Skills Academy. During the event, Huawei also hosted a summit on how AI is changing education, and introduced a new AI Course Solution meant to help universities build stronger digital skills programmes.
Shafika Isaacs from UNESCO praised the students for showing real creativity in solving practical problems, and stressed that the future of AI depends on cooperation between schools, governments, and industry players working together. Nigeria pulling off three straight years as the top non-Chinese country says a lot about the depth of tech talent coming out of Nigerian universities, even with the funding and infrastructure challenges many of these schools face daily.
If projects like the malaria detection device get the right backing, this competition could end up being more than just an award show. It could become one more pathway turning Nigerian student innovation into something that actually reaches the people who need it.
