Why IPL’s valuation dropped two years in a row

New Delhi: For the first time since the league’s inception, the Indian Premier League (IPL) has logged back-to-back declines in ecosystem value. D&P Advisory’s 2025 edition of Beyond 22 Yards pegs the IPL at Rs 76,100 crore ($8.8 bn) for 2025, down from Rs 82,700 crore ($9.9 bn) in 2024 and Rs 92,500 crore ($11.2 bn) in 2023, an 8.0% year-on-year slide and a cumulative Rs 16,400 crore (-17.7%) erosion over two seasons.

What the numbers say

• 2025 vs 2024: Rs 76,100 cr vs Rs 82,700 crore (-8.0%).
  
  
• 2024 vs 2023: Rs 82,700 cr vs Rs 92,500 crore (-10.6%).
  
  
• Two-year change: -Rs 16,400 crore (-17.7%).
  
  

D&P frames this as the league’s first sustained downturn, not a one-off blip.

Why it fell: two structural shocks

Media-rights rivalry collapsed after consolidation

The current rights cycle for 2023 to 2027 totals Rs 48,390 crore, with digital priced higher than television and a per-match value of a little over Rs 115 crore. Disney Star won India TV rights and Viacom18 won India digital in 2022. Those stacks later came together under JioStar. D&P argued that the post-merger consolidation of TV and digital rights under one umbrella of JioStar ended the two-horse bidding war that historically pushed rights and, therefore, valuations higher. With competitive tension easing, future rights escalation looks tamer, and the 2024 drop reflected this “plateauing after years of steep climb.”

Real-Money Gaming (RMG) ad and sponsorship ban

The Promotion & Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025, has effectively removed fantasy and other RMG brands from sports advertising and sponsorship. D&P’s 2025 report, and corroborating industry coverage, estimate Rs 1,500–Rs 2,000 crore of annual IPL-linked spend has vanished, hitting broadcasters, the league and franchises simultaneously. Dream11’s Rs 358 crore exit from the national jersey deal was the most visible sign of the broader retreat. The two-year valuation hit is “nearly Rs 16,400 crore (~$2.4 bn),” by D&P’s reckoning.

Where the pain was felt

• Broadcasters: RMG brands were premium digital buyers; their exit pulled down CPMs even amid record reach.
  
  
• Franchises and the league: Front-of-shirt and central sponsorships had visible RMG exposure; the ban created a sponsorship vacuum across tiers.
  
  
• National-team spillover: The RMG crackdown triggered Dream11’s exit from India’s jersey sponsorship, forcing a reset in rates and partner mix, an indicator of market-wide stress and re-pricing.

But the audience didn’t go away

Even as money tightened, reach and engagement stayed robust, with D&P noting over one billion viewers in 2025 and digital audiences surpassing TV. That strength didn’t offset the structural revenue loss, but it underpins medium-term resilience.

Advertising reality

Despite valuation pressure, ad monetisation hit fresh highs. As per the report, JioStar projected approximately Rs 4,500 crore at the start of IPL 2025 after signing 32 sponsors, and industry tallies at season close put ad receipts between Rs 4,800 crore and Rs 4,900 crore, with 425+ brands and around 270 first-time advertisers across over 40 categories. 

D&P added important texture on where the money came from and what went missing. It notes that RMG platforms were among the highest-yield digital buyers, often paying premiums for dominance. Their exit removed approximately Rs 1,500–Rs 2,000 crore of annual IPL-linked spend, creating a sponsorship and inventory gap that softened CPMs despite record reach and forced broadcasters to backfill with categories that spend less aggressively.

Even so, the merged distribution delivered the tournament’s largest cumulative audience on record and a digital-over-TV viewership mix, helping unlock the breadth of advertisers and sustained pricing on connected TV and premium placements. 

Context from the women’s game

The Women’s Premier League (WPL) also moderated from Rs 1,350 crore (2024) to Rs 1,275 crore (2025), down 5.6%, with D&P citing the same twin headwinds (broadcast consolidation and RMG ban). 

The road ahead: from auction spikes to steady compounding

D&P’s outlook is clear: the IPL must diversify sponsor bases (auto, BFSI, healthcare, consumer tech), innovate on digital monetisation (bundles, regional packs, commerce integrations), and restore bidding tension, potentially via global tech platforms, for the next rights cycle. The league’s challenge is re-acceleration without “auction fever” or RMG-fuelled spend.

The IPL’s valuation didn’t drop because fans left; it fell because two big engines that inflated value, rights rivalry and RMG money, stalled at once. Until competition returns to media rights and replacement categories scale up to fill a Rs 1,500–Rs 2,000 crore annual hole, valuations will reflect this reset, even if the cricket keeps breaking viewership records.