Mixi Global Investments said in a report today that India’s gaming market could reach $2.4 billion in revenues by 2029.
The India State of Play Report was prepared with data from Naavik, Sensor Tower, and AppsFlyer. The report finds that India’s mobile gaming market is maturing, its long-established scale is now being matched by rising player spending and a widening mix of genres.
Between 2020 and 2025, in-app purchase (IAP) revenue more than doubled even as download volumes held broadly steady, the clearest signal that one of the world’s largest gaming audiences is now beginning to monetize. Combined in-app and advertising revenue reached roughly $1.1 billion in 2025, is projected to hit $1.5 billion in 2026, and is on track to reach $2.4 billion by 2029.
India remains one of the largest gaming markets in the world by volume, with 600 million active players, up 9% year over year, and nearly 8 billion mobile game installs in 2025, trailing only China on downloads. While the data points to robust growth, the report highlights a more consequential narrative with a fundamental qualitative shift.
As smartphone adoption deepens, digital payments expand and the player base ages, spending per user is beginning to catch up with India’s long-established reach.
Growth is spreading well beyond shooters
For years, India’s revenue was concentrated in a single genre. Shooter titles, led by Free
Fire MAX and Battlegrounds Mobile India, still command the largest share of in-app
spending, at roughly 43% of the total.
What has changed is where the growth now comes from. Strategy has emerged as a standout, with the 4X subgenre growing 77% year over year, while newer niches expanded even faster. MOBA revenue more than tripled and card battlers grew over 90%.
Geolocation was 2025’s fastest-growing genre by revenue, up 75% on the back of localized live operations, and simulation surged on the strength of Roblox’s breakout year. Revenue is no longer riding one category; it is broadening across many.
The audience is diversifying
India’s gaming population still skews young and male overall, but the composition is
beginning to widen.
Puzzle games now draw close to 45% female players, lifestyle titles approach gender parity, and puzzle audiences skew notably older, with more than half of players aged 35 and above. These shifts point to incremental growth from segments that have historically been underserved, and to a market whose next wave of players will not look like its last.
“India has been one of the world’s largest gaming audiences for some time, but what the
data now shows is a market maturing with revenue deepening, growth spreading across
genres, and a widening range of players. That combination of scale and diversification is
what makes this moment worth watching,” said Tomoharu Urabe, managing director of investment at Mixi Global Investments, in a statement.
Across the data, culturally rooted experiences continue to outperform global franchises on
reach. Ludo King and Cricket League lead the download charts, and Indian studios built five
of the ten most-downloaded games of 2025.
Global hits succeed through deep local adaptation, India-specific versions optimized for lower-end devices, regional live events, and local esports, while “Made in India” titles such as ScarFall 2.0 are beginning to show higher production values aimed squarely at domestic audiences.
A broader analysis of the MIXI Global Investments’ report also covers India’s expanding
developer ecosystem, now more than 2,000 companies employing over 130,000 professionals, and adjacent categories such as microdramas, where India has become the world’s largest market by download volume.
MIXI Global Investments (MGI) is the corporate venture capital arm of MIXI, Inc., a publicly
listed Japanese consumer technology and entertainment company.