What is driving CTV growth in India? The six structural factors

India's connected TV market has grown from roughly 30 million households in 2020 to an estimated 70–80 million in 2025, and projections point toward 100 million by 2027. This is not organic drift — it is the product of six specific structural forces operating simultaneously. Understanding them matters for advertisers and publishers because they determine how fast the market grows, where growth is concentrated, and how long the current window of relatively low competition lasts.

1. Affordable smart TVs

The single biggest hardware driver of India CTV growth has been the collapse in smart TV entry prices. In 2018, a 32-inch smart TV in India cost ₹18,000–25,000. By 2025, the same category — Android TV, 32 inches, full HD — is available at ₹8,000–12,000 from brands like Thomson, Vu, iFFALCON, and Hisense. Samsung and LG have moved downmarket too, with 32-inch entry-level smart TVs at ₹12,000–16,000.

This price compression was driven by Chinese manufacturer entry (Hisense, TCL, Xiaomi/Mi TV), competition among Indian brands (Vu, Thomson, Kodak), and import duty structures that kept component costs manageable. The practical effect: smart TV penetration in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities became economically viable for middle-income households. A family replacing a 10-year-old CRT or LCD TV in Lucknow or Coimbatore buying a new television in 2022 or later almost certainly bought a smart TV — not because they specifically wanted streaming, but because smart TVs became the default TV at the replacement price point.

This passive replacement cycle is the least-discussed but most powerful driver of India CTV household growth. It doesn't require consumers to actively choose CTV — it happens when they buy any new TV.

2. JioFiber and home broadband penetration

JioFiber, Reliance Jio's fiber-to-the-home broadband service, launched commercially in 2019 and has since become the largest broadband provider in India by subscriber count. As of early 2026, JioFiber has approximately 12–14 million subscribers, heavily concentrated in metros and Tier 1/2 cities.

JioFiber's significance for CTV is twofold. First, it provides the high-bandwidth, low-latency home connectivity that enables high-quality smart TV streaming (4K content, low buffer rates). Second, JioFiber entry plans bundle JioHotstar at no additional cost — every JioFiber subscriber gets access to JioHotstar content as part of their broadband package. This created millions of households with both the hardware (smart TV) and the content subscription to become active CTV users without any additional purchase decision.

Airtel Fiber (Airtel Xstream Fiber) has followed a similar model, bundling Airtel Xstream streaming content with broadband plans and reaching approximately 7–8 million subscribers. Together, JioFiber and Airtel Fiber have wired the most valuable CTV households — metro and Tier 1 city, SEC A/B, high-bandwidth connectivity — into active streaming on connected TVs.

3. Jio 4G/5G mobile broadband as TV connectivity

Not all India CTV growth comes from homes with fixed broadband. A significant and often underappreciated segment connects their smart TV to the internet via a Jio 4G or 5G mobile hotspot. In non-metro India — Tier 2/3 cities, semi-urban areas, smaller towns where JioFiber hasn't reached — the TV connects via a phone's mobile data or a dedicated Jio WiFi router (JioFi).

Jio's 2016 free data launch permanently reset India's mobile data economics. India now has among the world's cheapest mobile data at ₹0.5–1 per GB on prepaid plans. A household spending ₹239/month on a Jio prepaid plan gets 1.5GB/day — enough for 1–2 hours of standard definition streaming per day. At this price, using mobile data to stream TV on a connected screen is economically accessible to SEC B/C households in ways that were impossible pre-Jio.

This "mobile-broadband CTV" segment is where India CTV diverges most sharply from Western markets. The audience is real and growing, but connectivity quality (buffer rates, resolution limits) is lower than fiber-connected smart TVs, and device identity signals are weaker (mobile IP addresses rather than stable home IP).

4. OTT bundling with telecom and DTH

OTT content bundling with telecom subscriptions has been the primary customer acquisition mechanism for India's streaming platforms. Rather than relying on consumers to choose and pay for streaming subscriptions independently, platforms have embedded their subscriptions inside mobile and broadband plans that consumers were already paying for.

The key bundling arrangements driving CTV usage:

Jio mobile → JioHotstar: Jio prepaid and postpaid plans above ₹299/month include JioHotstar Mobile subscription. Jio has ~450M subscribers; even a fraction activating their JioHotstar entitlement represents enormous platform scale.
JioFiber → JioHotstar All Access: JioFiber plans above ₹399/month include JioHotstar All Access (which includes Star channels on TV screens). This is the full connected TV content entitlement.
Airtel → Airtel Xstream + Disney+ Hotstar: Airtel postpaid and fiber plans bundle streaming access across Airtel Xstream's aggregated content and Disney+ Hotstar (now JioHotstar following the merger).
Tata Play → OTT aggregation: Tata Play (formerly Tata Sky) DTH service bundles multiple OTT subscriptions (JioHotstar, SonyLIV, Zee5) via its Tata Play Binge service, accessible on smart TVs through the Tata Play app.

The bundling model means millions of Indian households became JioHotstar subscribers through their telecom bill without a separate purchase decision. Activating that subscription on a connected TV was a one-time setup action — after which the household became part of the CTV advertising addressable universe.

5. IPL and live sports as the CTV gateway event

The Indian Premier League is the single biggest driver of CTV trial and habit formation in India. IPL matches draw India's largest streaming audiences — JioHotstar's 2024 IPL season averaged 50+ million concurrent streaming viewers per match at peak, with a significant portion watching on connected TV screens.

IPL's role in CTV growth is structural rather than incidental. It creates an annual event that:

Motivates households to set up their smart TV for streaming for the first time (the annual "how do I watch IPL on my TV" setup event)
Drives JioHotstar subscription upgrades — mobile-only subscribers upgrade to TV screen entitlement to watch on the big screen
Creates a sustained 2-month prime-time appointment viewing habit on connected TVs, building muscle memory for streaming-on-TV that persists beyond the tournament

ICC tournaments (World Cup, Champions Trophy), Pro Kabaddi League, and Indian football (ISL) play a similar but smaller role. The structural insight is that live sports is not just a content category on CTV — it is the primary activation mechanism that converts smart TV owners into active CTV streamers.

6. Post-COVID home entertainment habits

COVID-19 lockdowns in 2020–21 accelerated home entertainment consumption across all India income segments and permanently shifted viewing habits. Households that spent ₹500–1,000/month on cinema, dining, and entertainment redirected spending toward home internet and streaming services. Many of those spending shifts stuck.

More specifically, COVID normalised streaming as the primary entertainment mode for India's urban middle class and created the habit of family viewing on a TV screen — something that had previously competed with single-person mobile viewing. Families who watched shows together on a connected TV during lockdown were significantly more likely to maintain that behaviour after restrictions lifted than households that had never developed the habit.

This was a one-time acceleration rather than a sustained additional driver, but its legacy is a larger base of habitual CTV viewers who formed their streaming habits during 2020–21 and are now established members of the CTV advertising audience.

What this means for advertisers

Each growth driver creates a different audience segment with different characteristics:

Smart TV replacement cycle: Adds SEC B/C households in Tier 2/3 markets — large volume, lower CPMs, FAST inventory-heavy, Hindi and regional language content
JioFiber bundling: Adds SEC A/B metro households — high-value, JioHotstar premium inventory, sports and originals viewers, highest CPMs
Mobile broadband CTV: Adds Tier 2/3 non-metro households — large volume growth, weaker targeting signals, lower CPMs, FAST-heavy
IPL/live sports: Temporary quarterly spike across all segments; drives premium inventory pricing; high CPMs and viewer attention

The practical implication: India CTV is growing in both premium and mass-market directions simultaneously. Premium metro growth is additive to existing inventory. Mass-market growth is creating net-new inventory in segments that were not programmatically addressable three years ago. Both require different buying approaches, different CPM expectations, and different creative strategies.