Netflix's India decade: From 'HBO moment' to a hunt for mass reach

More than 16 million subscribers, about 50 million viewers and close to%4,000 crore in revenues.

- VANITA KOHLI-KHANDEKAR

Ten years after it entered India in January 2016, Netflix has firmly captured the country’s affluent, high-value consumer segment, which generates over three times the industry’s average revenue per user (Arpu), says Mihir Shah, vice-president at Media Partners Asia. Netflix accounts for roughly 10 per cent of India’s streaming video market by value and about 6 per cent of the 272 million over-the-top (OTT) subscribers the country had in 2025.

At first glance, the numbers can feel underwhelming, Jio Hotstar is about twice Netflix's size by revenue, and YouTube is about four times larger. The contrast is sharper because “Netflix is the Godzilla of the streaming world”, as Sameer Nair, managing director at Applause Entertainment, puts it. The service kickstarted paid streaming in 2010 and moved into originals in 2013 with *House of Cards*, showcasing the power of on-demand video.

Globally, Netflix is the largest paid-streaming service, with $39 billion in revenues and over 300 million subscribers. But “India is the first market where Netflix is not number one,” says Vivek Couto, chief executive officer and executive director at Media Partners Asia. “Netflix arrived as the original streaming service in India and accelerated the whole move to streaming,” says Nair. Until then, most broadcasters saw YouTube and other online platforms largely as catch-up viewing. At the time, there were barely 100 million unique visitors online, and likely only about half had bandwidth good enough to watch an entire series or film.