The Indian Premier League’s performance on the Star Sports Network looks grim, with average viewership falling significantly compared to last season. But why is that the case? Will it affect the league’s future on the network? And what does it mean for the product?
A recent report by the Financial Express revealed that TV viewership for the IPL 2026 season has been down compared to the 2025 season. The TV ratings saw an 18.8% dip, from 4.57 per match in 2025 to 3.71 this year.
The average viewership saw an even sharper fall. It went from 10.6 million average viewership last season to 7.86 million in 2026, a 26% drop. The total reach is also down from 123.96 million unique viewers in 2025 to 113.61 million for the 19th season, an 8.3% drop.
This means not only does each game see fewer people watching it, but fewer people have watched even a single game this season compared to last year.
But what is worse for Star Sports in the fall is advertiser participation. The 2025 season saw 65 separate brands advertise through the league. This number has fallen to 44 in IPL 2026. This is a fall of 31%. While 44 brands exited the IPL game after last year, only 24 new brands came in to replace them to advertise through the league.
The Star Sports Network took over the broadcasting of the Indian Premier League in 2018. A renewal of that deal in 2023 meant that the IPL will remain on the network till 2027. Now that we are nearing a decade of this competition’s home being Star Sports, why are we finally seeing a decline in viewership and advertising?
Why Is TV Viewership For IPL Declining
The question is, why is TV viewership for IPL declining? The first reason is the decline in TV viewership across the board. While this was a phenomenon in Western countries at first, it also started happening in India over the last decade.
Over the last six years, television in India has lost nearly 40 million pay-TV households. While the fall in sports viewership on traditional media is not as steep as that of other genres, it is still a massive fall nonetheless.
Another reason behind the fall, while not backed by any hard numbers, might be the narratives and characters. The IPL is a personality-driven league, with fans watching to see their favourite stars. And with the likes of MS Dhoni and Rohit Sharma missing the majority of the season, coupled with teams with massive fan followings like the Mumbai Indians and the Chennai Super Kings not doing well, one can make the case for it being the reason that the league viewership is down as a whole
Streaming and OTT platforms command about 44.8% of viewership in India, which is more than the combined numbers for cable TV (24.1%) and broadcast DTH TV (20.1%).
This move to OTT also plays a major role in the decline of IPL viewership on TV. The Indian Premier League has been digitally broadcast since 2020. The league was previously on Disney+ Hotstar before moving to JioCinema, which changed its name to JioHotstar last year.
The most recent renewal of the broadcast sale in 2023 saw the rights be sold off in packages, with one of the said packages being for exclusive domestic digital rights. This package was sold at a similar price to package A, which was for domestic TV rights.
However, in recent years, IPL’s viewership on OTT platforms has skyrocketed, surpassing the TV viewership. In 2025, JioCinema registered 652 million viewers for the IPL, compared to 537 million on Star Sports. This difference is set to widen in 2026.
Why Is OTT On The Rise?
Why people are shifting from TV to OTT is a far simpler question to answer: convenience and portability of the medium. To catch a game on TV, one needs to be at home or at a public place with televisions. On the other hand, people can watch IPL matches on JioHotstar on mobiles, laptops, and other streaming devices.
This means one can watch matches while in the office, while at work, or from anywhere. Plus, if there is one TV at home, which is what most households have, the other family members can watch the IPL on their personal devices.
Another reason for the rise in OTT viewership of the league is that the IPL has been free on JioHotstar for a couple of years. Not needing to pay to watch the biggest cricket league in the world is not only a splendid deal but also in the budget for anyone with a smartphone, which is practically everyone today.
Yet another reason for the shift to OTT has been the variety of features provided on the IPL broadcast on JioHotstar. Not only are there more than 20 specialised camera streams, including player cams and sky cams throughout the match, but also a live broadcast in 12+ languages, including those never seen before on national TV like Bhojpuri and Haryanvi.
JioHotstar has invested heavily in making the viewing experience of the Indian Premier League on their platform a never-before-seen experience. That is why they are overtaking TV in viewership of the league.
Now that we understand why TV viewership for the IPL is on the decline. This also makes clear why the advertising for the league on television is falling. However, there is another reason for that.
Why Are There Fewer Advertisers In IPL 2026?
The 2025 strike down on fantasy on e-commerce apps like Dream11 was a major blow to advertising partners on these platforms, the biggest of them being the Indian Premier League. Apps like Dream11 had to cease all paid real-money contests last year, which resulted in over 10 such contest platforms stopping advertising throughout the IPL, as they did not have the insane budgets they had before.
All this, coupled with the rise in viewership on OTT, means that come 2027, the IPL broadcast rights deal will more heavily focus on digital rights for the league.
The drop in viewership on TV, coupled with a fall in advertising, might spell trouble for the money-making machine that is the Indian Premier League. So, is the commercial sports league bubble in India about to burst, or will the IPL bounce back stronger than ever before?
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