




Small-budget regional films face streaming challenges despite increased demand for content
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. The surge in regional-language content on streaming platforms hasn’t really benefited small-budget films in languages other than Hindi, such as Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Punjabi and others.
Trade experts and industry executives said while acquisitions are mainly limited to Netflix, Prime Video and JioHotstar, and to a lesser extent SonyLIV and ZEE5, only about half of movies made in many of these smaller regional film industries find buyers, thanks to the packed calendars and limited budgets of streaming services. This means these films either remain completely unreleased or have to wait for a streaming platform to buy them after their theatrical release.
This is despite the fact that India’s streaming audiences are no longer binge-watching just in Hindi. Regional originals—from Tamil thrillers to Malayalam crime sagas—are steadily climbing the charts, drawing millions of viewers.
The mid-year list of the top 50 originals published by media consulting firm Ormax in 2025 underscored this trend. Among the most-watched titles were series two of Tamil fiction series Suzhal – The Vortex (8.3 million), Office (5.4 million) and Heart Beat (7 million); season two of Malayalam fiction series Kerala Crime Files (6.9 million), Tamil film Test (6.5 million), and Telugu fiction series Devika & Danny (5.2 million).
In October Netflix announced six new Tamil and Telugu originals, and in December JioHotstar said it would roll out 1,500 hours of fresh south Indian programming over the next year, alongside an investment of ₹4,000 crore over five years to strengthen the region’s content and creator ecosystem. “The main challenge right now is that national OTT (over-the-top) platforms are simply not
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