Mumbai: The 19th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) begins this weekend, where all eyes will be on the defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru, who clinched their first ever win last year. Meanwhile, there are big-name investors, including Temasek, EQT, Premji Invest, Adar Poonawalla and a couple of US-based sports investors, vying for stake in the Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers teams. Besides team owners, advertisers and broadcasters are also keeping an eye on how the economics of the IPL plays out.

However, even as earning from avenues such as advertising and team sponsorships continues to grow, data shows media rights revenues are still under pressure. As a new media rights cycle will begin in 2028, media consulting firm Media Partners Asia says the league continues to suffer from a “monetization gap”. What is this gap, and why does it persist? Mint explains

How is revenue shaping up for the IPL?

Per data from WPP Media’s ‘Sporting Nation’ report released this month, team sponsorship revenue for the IPL crossed a landmark to reach ₹1,033 crore in 2025. This, the report said, validated the economics of IPL’s franchise model, and showed that team jerseys are pulling in big advertisers. Also, cricket has begun attracting newer deep-pocketed advertisers to its lineup, including Big Tech who are replacing the big spending done by now-banned real money gaming companies.

Media research and consulting firm Media Partners Asia (MPA) said in a report this month that this season onwards, it expects much more advertising by Big Tech AI platforms, such as from Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

So, what’s not working in the IPL’s economic model?

Money from streaming or broadcasting the IPL is not coming in as it should. According to data from the MPA report quoted above, India’s Pay TV subscriber base peaked at 120 million in FY20, and has been in “accelerated” decline since FY23. At the same time, users of streaming platforms are rising rapidly, but they are not generating the same amount of revenue per user that a media rights holder can get from this online audience base. This has left platforms streaming the IPL with a ‘monetization gap’, the MPA says.

How big is the monetization gap?

Net monthly realizations per user—the revenue a streaming platform generates from showing the IPL—is stuck at $0.9-1.0 per television subscriber since 2019, according to MPA’s calculations. However, realizations on streaming fell from a peak of $1.40 per subscriber in 2019 to $0.6 today. This is largely because erstwhile Disney+Hotstar only showed IPL streams to its premium subscribers, but JioCinema (and later JioHotstar) made IPL free to watch in 2023, only taking it behind paywall again last year.

How could this affect prices of media rights for the upcoming 2028-32 cycle?

Media Partners Asia estimates that the IPL’s media rights value will stagnate at $5.4 billion in the next bidding cycle, while the rights fee per match may drop 13% to $11.5 million per match.

In the current cycle that started 2023, both these figures had jumped nearly threefold from the previous cycle, largely because of intense bidding competition between Star and Reliance’s Jio, which had not yet merged. In 2023-27, MPA says IPL’s media rights holders will end up with an operating loss of $1.75 billion due to a 20% drop in TV broadcast revenue, despite a 4x jump in streaming revenue.

The MPA projects that the IPL’s media rights model will finally break even in the next media cycle.

Are there valuation gaps in the IPL model?

Yes. The two IPL teams up for sale—Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Rajasthan Royals—are expected to fetch valuations of $1.3-1.5 billion and upwards each. However, data from MPA’s report quoted above shows neither team is in the top three.

RCB’s valuation is held back because it has had only one IPL win in 18 years and does not have any international presence, unlike rival Mumbai Indians, which tops MPA’s franchise scorecard. “It (RCB) is the most commercially visible franchise in the league, while being among the least institutionally resilient. That gap is the defining valuation risk,” the report said.

Data from the WPP Media report shows RCB tops the charts in TV reach, as well as social conversations and followers on leading social media platforms. This is largely due to an extremely loyal fan base compared to that of younger teams like Lucknow Super Giants. RCB's fan connect can be seen in the popularity of chants like Ee sala Cup namde (this year, the cup is ours in Kannada). Virat Kohli's star power also helps.

Rajasthan Royals lags newer teams such as Gujarat Titans and Sunrisers Hyderabad in TV reach, per WPP Media data, and is also a laggard in social media following and engagement. MPA ranks the team 7th out of ten, largely due to a relatively lacklustre performance in recent IPL seasons.

Mumbai: The 19th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) begins this weekend, where all eyes will be on the defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru, who clinched their first ever win last year. Meanwhile, there are big-name investors, including Temasek, EQT, Premji Invest, Adar Poonawalla and a couple of US-based sports investors, vying for stake in the Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers teams. Besides team owners, advertisers and broadcasters are also keeping an eye on how the economics of the IPL plays out.

However, even as earning from avenues such as advertising and team sponsorships continues to grow, data shows media rights revenues are still under pressure. As a new media rights cycle will begin in 2028, media consulting firm Media Partners Asia says the league continues to suffer from a “monetization gap”. What is this gap, and why does it persist? Mint explains

How is revenue shaping up for the IPL?

Per data from WPP Media’s ‘Sporting Nation’ report released this month, team sponsorship revenue for the IPL crossed a landmark to reach ₹1,033 crore in 2025. This, the report said, validated the economics of IPL’s franchise model, and showed that team jerseys are pulling in big advertisers. Also, cricket has begun attracting newer deep-pocketed advertisers to its lineup, including Big Tech who are replacing the big spending done by now-banned real money gaming companies.

Media research and consulting firm Media Partners Asia (MPA) said in a report this month that this season onwards, it expects much more advertising by Big Tech AI platforms, such as from Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

So, what’s not working in the IPL’s economic model?

Money from streaming or broadcasting the IPL is not coming in as it should. According to data from the MPA report quoted above, India’s Pay TV subscriber base peaked at 120 million in FY20, and has been in “accelerated” decline since FY23. At the same time, users of streaming platforms are rising rapidly, but they are not generating the same amount of revenue per user that a media rights holder can get from this online audience base. This has left platforms streaming the IPL with a ‘monetization gap’, the MPA says.

How big is the monetization gap?

Net monthly realizations per user—the revenue a streaming platform generates from showing the IPL—is stuck at $0.9-1.0 per television subscriber since 2019, according to MPA’s calculations. However, realizations on streaming fell from a peak of $1.40 per subscriber in 2019 to $0.6 today. This is largely because erstwhile Disney+Hotstar only showed IPL streams to its premium subscribers, but JioCinema (and later JioHotstar) made IPL free to watch in 2023, only taking it behind paywall again last year.

How could this affect prices of media rights for the upcoming 2028-32 cycle?

Media Partners Asia estimates that the IPL’s media rights value will stagnate at $5.4 billion in the next bidding cycle, while the rights fee per match may drop 13% to $11.5 million per match.

In the current cycle that started 2023, both these figures had jumped nearly threefold from the previous cycle, largely because of intense bidding competition between Star and Reliance’s Jio, which had not yet merged. In 2023-27, MPA says IPL’s media rights holders will end up with an operating loss of $1.75 billion due to a 20% drop in TV broadcast revenue, despite a 4x jump in streaming revenue.

The MPA projects that the IPL’s media rights model will finally break even in the next media cycle.

Are there valuation gaps in the IPL model?

Yes. The two IPL teams up for sale—Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Rajasthan Royals—are expected to fetch valuations of $1.3-1.5 billion and upwards each. However, data from MPA’s report quoted above shows neither team is in the top three.

RCB’s valuation is held back because it has had only one IPL win in 18 years and does not have any international presence, unlike rival Mumbai Indians, which tops MPA’s franchise scorecard. “It (RCB) is the most commercially visible franchise in the league, while being among the least institutionally resilient. That gap is the defining valuation risk,” the report said.

Data from the WPP Media report shows RCB tops the charts in TV reach, as well as social conversations and followers on leading social media platforms. This is largely due to an extremely loyal fan base compared to that of younger teams like Lucknow Super Giants. RCB's fan connect can be seen in the popularity of chants like Ee sala Cup namde (this year, the cup is ours in Kannada). Virat Kohli's star power also helps.

Rajasthan Royals lags newer teams such as Gujarat Titans and Sunrisers Hyderabad in TV reach, per WPP Media data, and is also a laggard in social media following and engagement. MPA ranks the team 7th out of ten, largely due to a relatively lacklustre performance in recent IPL seasons.