MUMBAI, India, 30th September, 2025—IMDb (www.imdb.com), the world’s most popular and authoritative source for information on movies, TV shows, and celebrities, today released a report. Titled 25 Years of Indian Cinema (2000-2025), featuring a comprehensive analysis of the Indian film industry’s evolution over the past quarter century. This analysis is based on IMDb data from over 250 million monthly users worldwide.
For the first time in five years (2020-2024), every major Indian language film amongst the top five highest grossing films each year has featured Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, and Malayalam. No other country in the world demonstrates this kind of linguistic diversity at the very top of its films and cinema.
This is a sharp contrast to 2000-2004 when Hindi blockbusters such as Kaho Naa…, Pyaar Hai, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham…, and Kal Ho Naa Ho reigned supreme in box office takings and there were only rare Tamil films such as Kannathil Muthamittal to join the mix.
Since 2020, we saw pan-Indian successes like Pushpa: The Rise (Telugu), Soorarai Pottru (Tamil), Jai Bhim (Tamil), RRR (Telugu), K.G.F.: Chapter 2 (Kannada), Kantara (Kannada), and Vikram (Tamil) alongside Hindi successes such as Dil Bechara, 83, Jawan, Animal, and 12th Fail. In 2022 four of the top five films were non-Hindi for the first time – a major turning point.
Each film industry is now showcasing a new blend of the same language industry: Telugu and Kannada films with visual spectacle (Baahubali, KGF, Pushpa), Malayalam films with realism (Jai Bhim), Tamil films with thrillers (Vikram and Leo), and Hindi films with mass entertainments (Jawan and Animal) and socially relevant dramas (12th Fail).
Today, India is the only country that has multiple language industries existing and thriving together at the grassroots highest level in film and cinema, creating a multilingual landscape unlike the rest of the world.
The full report is available for download here.
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