The recently concluded Indian Premier League garnered a total reach of 1.19 billion viewers with about 537 million on TV and 652 million on digital, as per a report released by JioStar in partnership with Media Partners Asia.
The final match of IPL’s 18th edition recorded a total reach of 426 million. Per the study, the world’s biggest annual cricket tournament has been the driving force behind the growth of JioStar’s subscriber base to 300 million.
IPL’s reach on connected TV was pegged at 235 million, while on mobile phone the reach was 417 million viewers.
According to the report, nearly 47% of the IPL viewers on Star Sports were women. The regional language feeds saw strong growth across Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Bengali and Haryanavi. The tournament’s watch time was estimated at 514 minutes.
The broadcaster also asserted that IPL 2025 was the year of advertisers, with over 425 advertisers choosing to leverage on the League during this season. Over 270 of these brands were debutants across 40 unique categories.
JioStar CEO – Sports & Live Experiences, Sanjog Gupta, said: “…This IPL, not only have we reached a billion viewers across platforms, we have also managed to make this IPL the most monetized edition of the event and also the most monetized sporting event ever in India across advertising and subscription revenue.”
Gupta further asserted: “We believe sports serves as a recruitment funnel to bring in viewers and fans at scale, who then can be taken on a journey on a platform which could entail a live event, a Hindi entertainment show, or it could entail one of our new originals which is marketed on the back of a big sporting event and a recent example of that is the returning season of Criminal Justice which benefited significantly by launching in the last week of IPL.”
Said “recruitment” costs are prohibitive, it bears pointing out.
While delivered a masterclass in sports platform strategy during the APOS 2025 conference, Gupta revealed that over the past decade and a half, the company has invested more than $500 million in growing sports properties through marketing, production and technology development — separate from rights fees (emphasis ours). In 2022, the five-year IPL rights were bought for $6.2 billion by the two entities who have since merged to form JioStar.
“There’s a joke in the company that all the money that Kevin [Vaz, CEO of entertainment] makes is actually spent by Sanjog,” Variety quotes Gupta as having said during his keynote at APOS, referencing the cross-platform benefits of sports viewership driving consumption of other content genres.
A Year of Firsts: Key Highlights from IPL 2025
Scale
● 1.19B total reach: 537MN on TV and 652MN on digital – TATA IPL 2025 on JioStar Network recorded the biggest reach ever
● 47% of IPL viewers on Star Sports were women
● The IPL Final attracted 426M (189MN on TV and 237MN on digital) reach during the final
● JioHotstar grew to 300 million subscribers. 1.04BN app downloads on Android
● 55.2M peak concurrency
● 235 million reach on Connected TV
● 417 million reach on mobile phones
● 514BN minutes of tournament watch-time
● 129 million viewers watched on Star Sports HD
● 840 billion minutes watch-time
Engagement
● MaxView 3.0 used by 30% of mobile viewers
● Regional language feed growth YoY: Hindi: 31%; Telugu: +87%; Tamil: +52%; Kannada: +65%; Bengali: +34%; Haryanvi: 47%
● 3.83B social interactions
● 44% of TATA IPL viewers on mobile experienced the thrill of ‘Jeeto Dhan Dhana Dhan’ play-along game
Brand
● It was a Year of the Advertisers on JioStar, with 425+ advertisers; 270+ debutants across 40 unique categories
● From market leaders to challengers, 32 brands across 9 categories leveraged Nielsen’s third party measurement
Technology
● TATA IPL 2025 on JioStar was one of the most immersive and engaging viewing experiences ever
● Multi-Cam in 16:9: Viewers could switch between multiple camera feeds (Batter Cam, Bowler Cam, Stump Cam) in 16:9 resolution on the JioHotstar app
● 360degree/ VR Streaming: Fans could enjoy live matches with an immersive 360° view on their mobile devices, or step into the action in Virtual Reality using devices like JioDive.
● MaxView 3.0: A vertical viewing experience that lets fans swipe up to catch key match moments or swipe sideways for alternate camera angles
● Voice Assisted Search on CTV: Connected TV viewers could search using voice commands, enabling a more intuitive, hands-free experience
● Introduction of Free Ad-supported Streaming TV (FAST) channels dedicated to TATA IPL, offering non-stop cricket content without a subscription
● AI – Powered Match Highlights: Full match highlights auto-generated using Al, available within minutes post-match
● AI led Live Translation of Cricket Experts: Real-time Al translations of live commentary helped regionalize cricket insights and make expert analysis accessible across languages
● Audio Descriptive Commentary for the visually impaired
● Indian Sign Language Interpretation for the live matches
