1001 Smart Cities
🇨🇮 Abidjan

SOTRA Monpass Card and Sotra Mobile

🤖 AI-generated summary · ◆ 10 sourced claims · 🔎 Last verified

This overview was generated with AI from the public sources listed below and checked against them before publication. It has not had a complete human fact-check — treat it as a starting point and follow the sources.

10 sourced claims on this page, none individually verified yet — turn on “Sources in the text” to see each one.

How this atlas is made · What “last verified” means · What “source-checked” means · The full record behind this page

Abidjan's bus operator swapped paper for a stored-value card in December 2018, launched an app in 2022 and made the phone itself the card in July 2025. It has never published how many riders use any of them.

Outcome🔄 Ongoing
Evidence🏛️ Officialgrades the sourcing — this entry states no impact figure
what does this mean?The strongest source is the operator's or the city's own reporting — an official report, dataset or press release. It grades who did the looking — not how well the project went. All four grades →
Run bySociete des Transports Abidjanais (SOTRA)
Scale🏙️ City-wide

Part of 1001 Smart Cities — 1,216 documented projects · 🏙️ 5 more in Abidjan · 🎫 Smart ticketing guide · 🚲 Mobility projects

SOTRA, Abidjan's main public transport operator, presented its Monpass ticketing system in Marcory on 28 December 2018: a pay-as-you-go 'Liberte' card loadable from 500 FCFA and shareable within a household, plus a personalised season-ticket card with student, civil-servant, express and other tariffs. The Sotra Mobile app followed on 27 December 2022 and has since added a virtual card (activated in July 2025), NFC and QR validation, mobile-money top-up for physical cards without visiting an agency, and live tracking of buses approaching a stop.

Live 📅 since 2018

🎓 Lesson

SOTRA has published the features but not the take-up: no source gives the number of Monpass cards in circulation or the share of journeys paid digitally, which is the only figure that would show whether the cash queue actually shrank.

🚲 MobilitySmart ticketingPublic transport

Sources

↗ Abidjan.net (media)Published 29 December 201829 December 2018. The Monpass launch: « La Societe des transports abidjanais (Sotra), a decide de s'inscrire resolument sur la voie de la digitalisation ». Names the two card types, the 500 FCFA minimum load on the Liberte card, the household-sharing feature and the list of season-ticket tariffs (scolaire, etudiant, fonctionnaire mensuel, prive, permanent, wibus, express, prestige). No supplier or fleet-coverage figure is given.
↗ Apple App Store (operator listing)Seller SOTRA. Version 1.0.0 released 27 December 2022; version history runs to 2.1.x in 2025, with release notes citing WAVE payment integration and virtual-card activation. Rating 4.2/5 from 351 ratings. This is what dates the app and disproves the press framing of a December 2025 'launch' — December 2025 was a feature release, not the app's debut.
↗ Afrik Soir (media)Published 9 December 20259 December 2025. Describes the current feature set: « creer sa carte virtuelle en quelques secondes, la recharger via les solutions de mobile money et regler immediatement son ticket a partir de son telephone », three validation paths (scan the bus QR, show a generated QR, or NFC), mobile-money top-up of physical Liberte and Abonnement cards, and « la possibilite de suivre en temps reel les bus approchant de son arret ». Contains no usage figures.
Show your work What this page rests on and what it can’t tell you · all 10 claims with their sources · the forensic record

Evidence file · public beta 10 addressable claims, 3 source dossiers, one permanent baseline. The file is unreviewed — an AI-assisted structural migration, not a human or expert endorsement. Every revision keeps a permanent copy under revision history.

Inspect the claims, one by one — verbatim text, sources and caveats for all 10

The text below is copied verbatim from the published record. Each claim names the source dossiers that carry it; caveats stay attached to the claim they qualify.

Claim 1 clm-4f1157b5a6c3b0a8 descriptive
SOTRA, Abidjan's main public transport operator
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
SOTRA's own communication, quoted in the article, presents it as the reference urban transport operator in Côte d'Ivoire.
Caveat
This is the operator's self-description; no ridership share is given.

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Afrik Soir (media)
Claim 2 clm-33af80e5ecaac1de quantitative
presented its Monpass ticketing system in Marcory on 28 December 2018
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The report dates the presentation of the Monpass ticketing to Friday 28 December in Marcory.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Abidjan.net (media)
Claim 3 clm-f0cbdeac554a9c62 quantitative
a pay-as-you-go 'Liberte' card loadable from 500 FCFA and shareable within a household
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The report says the Liberté card can be loaded from 500 FCFA and used by the whole family.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Abidjan.net (media)
Claim 4 clm-5109d56fa50af6b9 descriptive
a personalised season-ticket card with student, civil-servant, express and other tariffs
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The report lists the personalised subscription card and its tariffs, including student, civil-servant and express.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Abidjan.net (media)
Claim 5 clm-ab34a91c13e745a3 quantitative
The Sotra Mobile app followed on 27 December 2022
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The store listing, published by SOTRA, dates version 1.0.0 to 27 December 2022.
Caveat
The date is the first store release; press coverage in December 2025 described a later feature release as a launch.

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Apple App Store (operator listing)
Claim 6 clm-945e307c0fd8af13 quantitative
a virtual card (activated in July 2025)
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The release notes of version 2.1.0 (28 July 2025) record the activation of the virtual card; the December 2025 article describes creating it in the app.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Apple App Store (operator listing)
  2. Afrik Soir (media)
Claim 7 clm-7731a1ff4a05de9a descriptive
NFC and QR validation
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The article lists scanning the bus QR code, showing a generated QR code, or NFC as validation methods.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Afrik Soir (media)
Claim 8 clm-2da05977e55af29b descriptive
mobile-money top-up for physical cards without visiting an agency
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The article says physical Liberté and subscription cards can be topped up by mobile money without an extra trip.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Afrik Soir (media)
Claim 9 clm-1fad1a06b06a88ea descriptive
live tracking of buses approaching a stop
Published field
snippet · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
The article describes following buses approaching one's stop in real time.
Caveat
No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Afrik Soir (media)
Claim 10 clm-a39a2c2c22a86a02 descriptive
SOTRA has published the features but not the take-up: no source gives the number of Monpass cards in circulation or the share of journeys paid digitally
Published field
lesson · verbatim
Mapping
mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this file
What the mapping says
Both the 2018 launch report and the 2025 feature article describe functions and contain no usage figures.
Caveat
This records an absence: no figure was found in the sources listed or in a search up to November 2026.

Sources carrying this claim

  1. Abidjan.net (media)
  2. Afrik Soir (media)
Forensic record — source dossiers, gaps, hashes and the exact revision this page renders

This layer records what is known about each source, what is still missing, and the exact snapshot this page is rendering. A missing date, archive or hash stays visible as missing.

unreviewed Revision 2026-11-04-evidence-baseline effective 2026-11-03 · created 2026-11-04

Awaiting operator and domain-expert review; publication of this revision implies neither.

sha256:4ee98297df00a4ca3106971c5112a746a3ced6640859fef1241909096f9e627c
Revision history → Permanent version link → Machine-readable record → Evidence Constitution →
10
of 10 claims mapped
3
source dossiers
2
publication dates recorded
0
archives linked
0
exact locators
0
content captures hashed

Governance facts carried by the record

Operator
Societe des Transports Abidjanais (SOTRA)
Actor types
national-government
Funding model
public
Funding description
Not recorded
Cost
Not recorded
Ownership
Not recorded
Decision rights
Not recorded
Exit conditions
Not recorded

3 source dossiers

Abidjan.net (media) news.abidjan.net · 4 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID
src-b73132d5e1a2c150
Publisher
Name not classified · news.abidjan.net
Type / language
web-page · language not classified
Published
2018-12-29
Updated
Not recorded
Source last checked
No source-level check date
Record last verified
2026-11-03
Dossier created
2026-11-04
Retrieved copy
No local capture recorded
Archive
No archived copy linked
Content hash
No captured content hash
Locator
Open the recorded source note

29 December 2018. The Monpass launch: « La Societe des transports abidjanais (Sotra), a decide de s'inscrire resolument sur la voie de la digitalisation ». Names the two card types, the 500 FCFA minimum load on the Liberte card, the household-sharing feature and the list of season-ticket tariffs (scolaire, etudiant, fonctionnaire mensuel, prive, permanent, wibus, express, prestige). No supplier or fleet-coverage figure is given.

Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked
Apple App Store (operator listing) apps.apple.com · 2 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID
src-e0bd96b82e26c884
Publisher
Name not classified · apps.apple.com
Type / language
web-page · language not classified
Published
Not recorded
Updated
Not recorded
Source last checked
No source-level check date
Record last verified
2026-11-03
Dossier created
2026-11-04
Retrieved copy
No local capture recorded
Archive
No archived copy linked
Content hash
No captured content hash
Locator
Open the recorded source note

Seller SOTRA. Version 1.0.0 released 27 December 2022; version history runs to 2.1.x in 2025, with release notes citing WAVE payment integration and virtual-card activation. Rating 4.2/5 from 351 ratings. This is what dates the app and disproves the press framing of a December 2025 'launch' — December 2025 was a feature release, not the app's debut.

Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked
Afrik Soir (media) afriksoir.net · 6 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID
src-0c0e2332014ea54e
Publisher
Name not classified · afriksoir.net
Type / language
web-page · language not classified
Published
2025-12-09
Updated
Not recorded
Source last checked
No source-level check date
Record last verified
2026-11-03
Dossier created
2026-11-04
Retrieved copy
No local capture recorded
Archive
No archived copy linked
Content hash
No captured content hash
Locator
Open the recorded source note

9 December 2025. Describes the current feature set: « creer sa carte virtuelle en quelques secondes, la recharger via les solutions de mobile money et regler immediatement son ticket a partir de son telephone », three validation paths (scan the bus QR, show a generated QR, or NFC), mobile-money top-up of physical Liberte and Abonnement cards, and « la possibilite de suivre en temps reel les bus approchant de son arret ». Contains no usage figures.

Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked
Known limits of this file
  • Publisher names and source languages have not yet been classified; domains are recorded without guessing.
  • Existing source notes are descriptive locators, not page- or paragraph-exact citations.
  • A missing archive, publication date or content hash is shown as null rather than inferred.
  • The project-level evidence grade ranks the strongest source in the entry; it is not a truth score for every claim.

Continue exploring

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Explore the wider context

🔑 Your Smart City Is Owned by Someone Else📖 Bus rapid transit (BRT)📖 E-ticketing📖 Fare capping
📎 Cite this project

1001 Smart Cities (2026). “SOTRA Monpass Card and Sotra Mobile” — Abidjan, Ivory Coast. The Smart City Atlas. https://1001smartcities.org/projects/abidjan-sotra-monpass/ (last verified 2026-11-03). Data: CC BY 4.0.

The underlying data is free to reuse with attribution — see the open data page.

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