The 2024 concert gold rush: International artists flock to India's booming live music scene

The year 2024 was extraordinary for India’s live music scene, with the country hosting the highest number of independent tours by international artists. Over 11 global stars performed standalone concerts, excluding those who headlined full-fledged festivals in 2024. These included Bryan Adams’ five-city So Happy It Hurts tour, Alan Walker’s record-breaking ten-city Walkerworld India tour, Dua Lipa’s Feeding India concert with Zomato, and Maroon 5’s first Mumbai show.

Adding to the tally, Canada-based Indian-origin artists AP Dhillon and Karan Aujla also performed this year. Even Rihanna and Justin Bieber graced the stage with private concerts during the Ambani wedding celebrations, pushing the total count of standalone tours by international artists in India this year to 15. Comparatively, only eight independent tours took place last year, with far fewer in previous years.

2024 has not only been about breaking records but also building anticipation for 2025. Before the fiscal year ends, India is set to welcome four major international tours—Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres tour in Mumbai and Ahmedabad, Ed Sheeran’s six-city tour, Cigarettes After Sex’s three-city tour, and Martin Garrix’s Holi bash with Sunburn Arena. These don’t even include Lollapalooza 2025, a Mumbai-based two-day music festival, which will feature 14 international acts, including Shawn Mendes, Green Day, and Louis Tomlinson.

This surge reflects the growing lucrativeness of India as a concert destination. As the live music industry flourishes, India is rapidly solidifying its position on the global entertainment map.

BookMyShow's year-end data reiterates this rapid growth of live events in India. In 2022, the country hosted just 19,000 live events, with concerts forming a small portion of the total. This number rose to 26,359 in 2023, marking a 39% increase year-on-year. In 2024, the figure climbed further to 30,687 live events. The platform also reported an 82% year-on-year growth in live entertainment participation in 2023, reflecting a rising preference among audiences for events featuring international artists.

International artists opt for solo tours, but music festivals continue to thrive

A notable shift in India’s live music scene is the growing trend of international artists opting for standalone tours, moving beyond performances tied to major festivals. While music festivals like Lollapalooza, Bandland, Echoes of Earth, and NH7 Weekender continue to see a rise, standalone tours are also gaining traction. For instance, Cigarettes After Sex, who headlined NH7 in 2017 and Lollapalooza (also called Lolla) in 2023, are now returning to India with their own tour. Similarly, Ed Sheeran, who performed last year, will return in 2025, marking consecutive appearances in two years.

Now take Lollapalooza, for example. Launched in 2023, its debut edition featured 16 international artists out of 39 performers. This share grew in 2024, with 19 of the 38 acts being global names. For the 2025 lineup, 14 of the 28 performers are international artists, highlighting the festival's increasing global focus. A broader definition of an international artist for now, would be essentially anyone not of Indian origin.

Aside from 2023 and 2024, India has had other standout years for international performances, such as 2017, when Cigarettes After Sex, Coldplay, Ed Sheeran, and Justin Bieber performed, or 2019, which saw acts like Katy Perry and Dua Lipa. But these were only outliers.

Anil Makhija, COO-Live Entertainment & Venues, BookMyShow (BMS), attributes the growing interest of international artists in India to the rising demand for premium entertainment experiences driven by digital penetration and global exposure. As the second-largest audio streaming market for many global artists, India has seen a surge in live music concerts, with attendance now viewed as a marker of cultural engagement among younger audiences. This trend extends beyond metros to Tier-2 cities like Kanpur, Shillong, and Gandhinagar, which reported a 682% rise in live events, signalling the democratisation of entertainment.

“Enhanced production capabilities and investments in technology have further elevated the quality of events, enabling a truly immersive and compelling audience experience,” Makhija says.

“This upgrade is crucial for meeting the production demands of A-list international artists who require advanced setups for their high-energy performances,” he adds.

Hospitality and travel also see a boost

The concert boom in India has become a goldmine for ticketing platforms and ancillary industries. Income from live events has surged 9.5 times, with exponential growth witnessed post-pandemic as experience-driven spending soared. A Bank of Baroda report estimates total expenditure on concerts and live entertainment at ₹1,600-2,000 crore annually, with a potential to scale up to ₹6,000-8,000 crore annually if this avenue is further explored.

India’s favourable demographics and growing penetration into niche audiences position the sector as a key driver of private spending. Of the ₹2,000 crore spent, over 25% is allocated to hotels and transport, with transport taking a slightly larger share, highlighting the broader economic impact of the live entertainment industry.

Concerts cause tickets havoc

As international artists tap into the Indian market, the ticket frenzy too has reached new heights. The introduction of pre-sale and general sale categories became a key trend this year, where partnerships with specific banks including Tata Neu, Kotak, and HSBC allowed consumers to purchase tickets earlier, often at subsidised rates, creating an added incentive for fans. Most concerts saw strategic partnerships with major banks.

“Since launching these concert experiences, we have witnessed first-hand the excitement it has generated among our customers. For Dua Lipa, we saw interest from customers wanting to attend the concert as a family and for Bryan we saw interest from customers in the higher age bracket who followed the singer in 80-90s. Almost 40-50% of the tickets to these shows were sold out in the pre-sales window itself. The trend continued even for Ed Sheeran as well,” Sandeep Batra, Head, Wealth and Personal Banking, HSBC India told Fortune India.

Almost 56% of the tickets for Dua Lipa’s concert were purchased using HSBC credit cards during the pre-sale.

The limited availability of tickets, however, compared to the overwhelming demand has given rise to a parasitic trend—ticket scalping. The most talked-about instance involves Coldplay’s upcoming January concert, where tickets were resold for as high as ₹1 lakh on platforms like Viagogo and StubHub. The issue escalated further as complaints surfaced about the transparency of BookMyShow’s queue system, which was implemented to manage the heavy demand.

“In India, considering the quotes from different unorganized ticket selling platforms, a rough conservative estimate for ticket selling itself amounts to around ₹1,000-1,200 crore in this concert season,” the Bank of Baroda report said.

While scalping proved profitable for some events, it backfired in cases like Karan Aujla’s It Was All a Dream tour. Tickets were purchased speculatively for resale at higher prices but ultimately remained unsold, highlighting the risks of ticket scalping.

BMS, Zomato and Swiggy gear up for live-event battle and infrastructure worries

This year’s concert frenzy also intensified the battle for market share in the live entertainment space. Zomato entered the fray by acquiring Paytm’s Insider business and restructuring it into a standalone app called District. Meanwhile, Swiggy is gearing up to officially launch its live entertainment booking platform, Scenes, by March next year, turning the live events sector into a fiercely competitive arena.

However, there are still concerns to address. Punjabi actor and singer Diljit Dosanjh recently complained about poor concert infrastructure, while a video of Monali Thakur refusing to perform in Varanasi due to poor event management went viral. These incidents highlight the urgent need to enhance infrastructure to fully capitalise on India’s concert boom and avoid becoming a global embarrassment with dissatisfied artists and audiences.