India is already the world’s second-largest music streaming market by volume. By revenue, it barely cracks the global top 15. That gap between consumption and monetisation is the central tension shaping the future of the Indian music industry and it’s why 2026 is being quietly positioned as a turning point.
After years of free listening dominating user behaviour, labels, platforms and rights bodies are now pushing hard for a paid ecosystem. The question is no longer whether India will become a serious music market, but how quickly it can convert scale into sustainable revenue.
The Big Bet: India as a Paid Music Powerhouse
Universal Music Group is among the most bullish on India’s prospects. Devraj Sanyal, Chairman and CEO of Universal Music India and South Asia, recently summed up the opportunity bluntly:
“India has approximately 15 million people who pay for music, in a country that has over a billion and half people. What half a cup of coffee costs today can buy you a Spotify or an Apple Music or a YouTube Music.”
His core argument is simple: affordability is no longer the barrier. Behaviour is.
According to FICCI and EY, India’s paid music subscribers rose from around 8 million to over 10.5 million in 2024, even as the overall streaming audience dipped slightly due to platforms discouraging free usage. Victoria Oakley, CEO of IFPI, told delegates at All About Music in Mumbai:
“In the past 18 months, we haven’t seen growth in India. But it remains a market with extraordinary potential.”
By 2026, industry projections put India’s music market at roughly Rs 7,800 crore ($889 million), growing at over 13% annually. That is still small by global standards, but the trajectory is steep.
Streaming at Scale, Monetisation Still Lagging
India’s streaming numbers are staggering. Luminate’s 2025 Year-End Music Report estimates nearly 490 billion on-demand streams across audio and video in a single year, second only to the US.
Yet average revenue per user remains among the lowest in the world. As Vikram Mehra, Chairman of the Indian Music Industry (IMI) and Managing Director of Saregama, put it at the All About Music conference:
“For a country of 1.4 billion people and 800 million smartphone users, it’s an abysmally small number.”
Per-stream payouts in India range between 2 to 5 paise, down from nearly double that a few years ago. Even Spotify’s recent price hike to Rs 199 per month still makes India one of its cheapest markets globally.
This creates a paradox: India is a global consumption giant, but a financial lightweight.
The Rise of I-Pop and Regional Power
One of the most significant shifts since 2020 has been the rise of non-film music. Spotify reports that 50% of the top 10 most-streamed songs in India in 2025 were I-Pop, its term for Indian pop music outside Bollywood.
Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu and Marathi tracks now dominate charts across platforms. Gaana reported a 96% rise in regional language streams, with South Indian music seeing triple-digit growth.
Arijit Singh’s entry into Spotify’s global top 10 artists marked a symbolic moment: for the first time, an Indian artist broke into the worldwide mainstream without being tied to a Western crossover campaign.
As Luminate’s data shows, nearly 80% of all streams in India are for Indian artists, making it one of the most locally-driven music markets on Earth.
Live Music: The New Revenue Engine
While recorded music struggles with monetisation, live events are booming.
Coldplay sold over 110,000 tickets in Ahmedabad alone, generating an estimated Rs 641 crore in economic impact. Travis Scott’s Delhi shows drew 125,000 fans. Rolling Loud India debuted with 60,000 attendees.
BookMyShow reports that more than half a million Indians travelled to another city just to attend a concert in 2025, an 18% year-on-year jump.
Live Nation and EY now describe India’s concert economy as one of the fastest-growing in Asia, even as the country has fewer than 10 purpose-built venues with capacity above 10,000.
In other words: demand is far ahead of infrastructure.
Performance Rights and the Quiet IP Revolution
One of the most underreported stories in Indian music is the rise of performance royalties. The Indian Performing Right Society (IPRS) collected nearly Rs 700 crore in 2024–25, up 42% year-on-year.
This growth is being driven by international streaming, better rights enforcement, and growing awareness among artists about intellectual property.
For decades, India’s music economy was built on opaque contracts and one-time buyouts. That model is slowly being replaced by recurring revenue through digital rights, sync licensing and performance income.
As more Indian music travels globally, rights management is becoming the industry’s most strategic asset.
What 2026 Really Looks Like
India is unlikely to be a top five music market by revenue. But it will almost certainly be the most important growth market globally.
The fundamentals are impossible to ignore:
- Over 800 million smartphone users
- The world’s youngest major population
- A creator economy with over 200 million active content creators
- Nearly half of Indian music royalties already coming from overseas listeners
The real transformation will not come from more users. It will come from fewer free users and more paying ones.
As Universal’s Sanyal puts it, the shift is cultural, not technical. The infrastructure already exists. The platforms are ready. The music is global.
What’s left is convincing India that music is worth paying for.
And once that happens, the world’s biggest listening market may finally become one of its biggest music businesses.
