International Journal of Informatics and Communication Technology (IJ-ICT)
Vol 15, No 4: December 2026

Machine learning analysis of telecom customer churn in California

Tianyu Lan (Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM))
Hanan Aldowah (Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM))
Sohail Ahmed Shahani (Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS (UTP))



Article Info

Publish Date
01 Dec 2026

Abstract

Customer churn is a significant concern in the telecommunications industry, particularly in highly competitive and price-sensitive markets such as California. Although machine learning methods are widely applied for churn prediction, their practical adoption is often limited by insufficient interpretability. This study develops an interpretable and business-oriented churn analysis framework by comparing multiple machine learning models, including logistic regression (LR), random forest (RF), support vector machine (SVM), and extreme gradient boosting (XGBoost), combined with shapley additive explanations (SHAP)-based explanation techniques. Using a real-world California telecom customer dataset, the framework identifies key churn determinants related to contract characteristics, pricing sensitivity, and customer service behaviors. Experimental results demonstrate that XGBoost achieves the best predictive performance among the evaluated models, while SHAP provides transparent explanations of feature contributions, highlighting the importance of contractual and pricing factors for customer retention strategies.

Copyrights © 2026






Journal Info

Abbrev

IJICT

Publisher

Subject

Computer Science & IT

Description

International Journal of Informatics and Communication Technology (IJ-ICT) is a common platform for publishing quality research paper as well as other intellectual outputs. This Journal is published by Institute of Advanced Engineering and Science (IAES) whose aims is to promote the dissemination of ...