India to overtake China as largest SVOD market by 2030; revenue gap to persist: MPA

New Delhi: India will overtake China to emerge as the largest market for SVOD subscriptions by 2030, with 358 million individual subscriptions. Yet, despite growing rapidly, India’s premium VOD revenue pie, including subscriptions and advertising, will remain 4.5x smaller than that of China and 2.5x smaller than Japan.

These projections are part of Media Partners Asia’s Asia-Pacific Video & Broadband 2026 (AVB 2026), which flags that Asia-Pacific total screen revenues will continue to grow through 2030, but the net growth will be increasingly concentrated in streaming, social video and connected TV, while traditional television faces sustained structural pressure.

The report estimates that between 2025 and 2030, the premium video on demand category, which includes SVOD and branded or premium ad-supported VOD, will add about US$12.5 billion in incremental revenue, taking the segment to US$52 billion by the end of the decade.

Over the same period, user-generated and social video revenues are projected to expand by US$11.4 billion to US$44.5 billion, making creator-led platforms the single largest growth engine across the Asia-Pacific screen economy. 

In contrast, traditional television revenues are projected to decline by a cumulative US$8.0 billion, reflecting ongoing weakness in linear advertising and pay-TV subscriptions.

Commenting on the findings, Vivek Couto, CEO and Executive Director of Media Partners Asia, said value is “shifting decisively toward streaming, social platforms and CTV-led monetization,” with markets that have scale, pricing power and strong local content ecosystems expected to outperform. 

He added that winners will be defined not just by volume but by the ability to monetise premium experiences anchored by sports, high-quality local programming and emerging formats such as micro-dramas, alongside AI-enabled efficiency across the content value chain.

At an overall level, AVB 2026 projects Asia-Pacific screen industry revenues to expand at a 2.8% CAGR between 2025 and 2030 to cross US$196 billion, with all net growth generated by online video, which is expected to grow at a 7% CAGR.

MPA said incremental premium VOD growth will be led by Japan, China and India, followed by Australia, Korea and Indonesia. On the user-generated and social video side, revenues are projected to grow on the back of advertising and expanding CTV inventory, with China, Japan, India and Australia leading the gains.

The report also underlined rising concentration in online video. It said the top 15 online video platforms accounted for 58% of total online video revenues in 2025, led by YouTube, ByteDance’s Douyin and TikTok, and Netflix, alongside national champions such as JioHotstar and U-NEXT.

In traditional television, MPA said China, Japan and India will account for nearly 70% of the region’s projected revenue contraction.

AVB 2026 is MPA’s flagship annual research report and database covering streaming, user-generated and social video, free-to-air TV, pay-TV, connectivity and theatrical exhibition across 14 Asia-Pacific markets, with forecasts extending through 2030.