Summary
- Bharti Airtel dethrones Jio with 54 lakh new subscribers in the month of December 2025.
- Airtel is now the leading wireless network service provider in 11 major cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Assam.
- Overall, Jio remains the market leader with 39.31% market share, followed by Bharti Airtel with 37.24%.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has published its annual telecom report for the year 2025. It has revealed strong subscriber growth for Bharti Airtel in India, overtaking Reliance Jio in net subscriber additions in December 2025.
Airtel posts strong growth as Jio trails behind
As per TRAI's latest annual Telco performance report, Bharti Airtel has managed to add 54 lakh new subscribers in December 2025. This is the highest amongst all the network providers and is also Airtel's best month in recent years. For comparison, Airtel only added 4,96,087 (~ 5 lakh) subscribers in the month of November 2025. It translates to a staggering 980% jump in mere 60 days.
However, it is not only Airtel that has gained new subscribers. Reliance Jio emerged second with 29 lakh new subscribers in December 2025. As for Vodafone Idea (Vi), BSNL and MTNL, all three providers lost subscribers. The major hit was taken by Vi with 9 lakh lost subscribers.
Moreover, Airtel also emerged as the highest M2M (Mobile to Mobile) cellular data connection provider for the year 2025. With 66.95 million active connections, it holds the majority M2M market share at 61.31%. This makes Bharti Airtel the leading 3G, 4G and 5G connection provider in 11 major telco regions: Andhra Pradesh & Telangana, Assam, Bihar, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Mumbai, the North East, Punjab, and Tamil Nadu.
Overall, Bharti Airtel has posted a strong performance in 2025, rivaling Jio in terms of subscribers and market capture. However, it is still trailing behind with a 37.24% overall network market share in India. Jio is still the largest network provider in the country for the sixth consecutive year with an overall 39.31% market captured.
