



Has southern cinema fallen prey to Bollywood’s high ticket pricing?
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Unreasonably high ticket pricing, long seen as a tactic used largely by Bollywood film-makers to bolster openings, has now crept into southern cinema, with disappointing results. According to media consulting firm Ormax, footfall in Telugu cinema declined to 181 million in 2025, from 213 million in 2024 and 242 million in 2023.
This underscores a key imbalance: While the box office collection rose about 1% year-on-year, the growth was driven largely by higher average ticket prices (ATP), particularly for tentpole films, rather than increased admissions. While some agree that southern audiences are averse to price hikes, others point out that the content is to blame as well. “It is worrying that the box office may be at an all-time high but admissions are down, which means we’re pricing certain sections of the audience out of theatres," Rahul Puri, managing director of Mukta Arts and Mukta A2 Cinemas said.
Pricing plays a significant role in industries such as Tamil and Telugu, Puri added, and in case of films such as Pushpa 2: The Rule, where decisions on rates came from producers and distributors, it did impact footfall. In the case of Pushpa 2, tickets priced over ₹1,200 in some multiplexes, including in home states Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, resulted in pan-India footfall of about 40 million. A comparable blockbuster, Baahubali 2, had clocked in admissions of over 60 million in 2017.
Some industry experts caution against pinning the decline solely on pricing. A thinner release pipeline, delays in big-ticket films, and the weakening pull of mid-budget titles have also kept audiences away. Tamil cinema offers a telling example.
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