As one of the largest and fastest-growing music markets in the world, India has commanded the attention of the entire music industry over the past several years.
Historically, India’s music business has been dominated almost exclusively by Bollywood, with film soundtracks often being a stronger force for music discovery than even radio. But Luminate data shows some old precedents have shifted as the country — especially younger music listeners — embraces music streaming.
To be clear, Bollywood remains incredibly popular in India overall: Luminate music consumption data found it accounted for 33.5% of total On-Demand (Audio + Video) streams within India in H1 2026. By comparison, Pop was the second most popular genre during that period but had only around half of Bollywood’s share at 16.8%.
With India’s streaming market exploding over the past several years, Bollywood has enjoyed consistent listenership growth. Between H1 2022 and the same period in 2026, total official On-Demand streams (which excludes UGC content) for the Bollywood genre in India grew 150.7%, from 29.2B to 73.2B.
What’s more interesting is that between H1 2025 and H1 2026, Bollywood streams outside of India grew by 8.2%, while listenership within the country was only 5.1%.
In other words, Bollywood may be experiencing a similar trend that played out with other once region-specific genres: Greater streaming adoption in emerging markets led to local genres and artists having greater international reach. Latin and K-pop are the most prominent examples, but this trend has also helped non-English genres such as Afrobeats, J-pop and C-pop reach larger global audiences.
Bollywood’s slowing streaming growth back home may also be part of a wider cultural shift within India’s music landscape. As covered in the Luminate report Asia: A Global Force in Music earlier this year, a perfect storm of rapid streaming adoption, the pandemic curbing film releases and younger generations preferring online content over traditional entertainment has led to the emergence of artist-driven music scenes independent from the Bollywood system.
Indeed, recent Luminate survey data suggests that younger music listeners are the primary consumers for non-Bollywood genres. Specifically, high percentages of Gen Z respondents in India reported listening to Pop, EDM and Latin on a weekly basis.
As streaming adoption keeps increasing across India, especially among younger consumers, we can likely expect listenership for these global genres to keep rising. That trend, in turn, will open opportunities for India to continue to integrate into the global music industry, whether it be through cultivating local music scenes outside of Bollywood or attracting international touring artists.
