Within just five days of its launch, Hotstar rocketed to a million downloads, which grew to 10 million by the end of month one, and 25 million downloads in four months, making it the fastest adoption of any new app globally. Hotstar is the only platform where the best TV shows from around the world, movie premieres and live sports and events, are available on a single platform.
Digital
The unbelievable journey to success for Hotstar
How Hotstar became India’s favourite app
Hotstar was launched in February 2015 to drive content consumption in India, and has quickly grown into India’s largest premium streaming platform. Widely acknowledged as the creator and leader, Hotstar is already young India’s favoured destination for high quality content.
It is the only service with content partnerships with the top three global studios – HBO, Fox and Disney. With nearly 100,000 hours of exclusive content across eight languages and coverage of the biggest sporting events from around the world including cricket, football, kabaddi, tennis, F1, badminton and more, Hotstar offers one of the biggest and most diverse content portfolios in the world.
We believe it’s important to be where people are. For a lot of consumers, on-demand content and the time they spend on their personal devices is an addition to all the other screens available to them. Hotstar is an expression of our desire to lead and shape digital consumption by creating a world-class service that delights this younger audience.
When Hotstar launched its Premium service in April 2016, it's entertainment offering became even more superior – the best of international shows were now available in India alongside their US airing and movie premieres. The lineup on the Premium service includes Emmy award winning TV shows such as 'Game of Thrones', 'The Night Of', 'Westworld', 'Veep', and 'American Crime Story' that are all available in India exclusively on Hotstar. The Premium service is at a cost of Rs 199 per month.
100 million downloads on the Google Play Store
In April 2017, Hotstar became the first Indian service to cross 100 million downloads on the Google Play Store. Almost all of Hotstar’s downloads have come from India. Hotstar reached this milestone within just 2 years of its launch in 2015. Across the Play Store, App Store and other Android app stores cumulatively, Hotstar has crossed more than 200 million downloads since launch.
Hotstar is leading the charge not just with its content but also with its robust technology backbone. The platform has set new benchmarks in video quality that ensures continuous video playback even in the most network-constricted environment. Video technology optimisations have enabled device-adaptive video streaming that adjusts itself to deliver the best possible video quality with the available bandwidth, and Hotstar’s player technology ensures that there is never any compromise on audio-video quality. Addressing critical consumer pain points of high data costs and large-scale unavailability of broadband data, Hotstar allows people to download its content on Wi-Fi for offline viewing. Hotstar’s subscribers are not only able to reduce their mobile bills but also enjoy seamless streaming of their favourite shows and movies even when they are in patchy network areas.
Channels
Related Stories
A Fearless Journey
Star Bharat aims to inspire the ‘average Bharatiya’ to chase their dreams by overcoming the fear that holds them back.
Entertainment
We are the nation's storyteller
We create the most exciting, emotional, and phenomenal programming – thrilling the whole of India with our stories.
Sports
Unleashing the sporting revolution
From Kabaddi to cricket and football, our sports go beyond just entertaining people – we encourage India to get active.
Movies
Big screen dreams
Our movies constantly redefine the possibilities of cinema. We want people to experience magic when they watch them.