Indian content on Netflix amasses over 1 billion views in 2023

Indian series and films on Netflix garnered over 1 billion views in 2023, indicating a rising interest in local content on the platform. The latest engagement report offers detailed performance metrics for Indian titles, with several making it to the top 400 list.

Top-performing Indian films included “Jaane Jaan” (ranked 83 with 20.2 million views), “Jawan” (ranked 120 with 16.2 million views), and “Khufiya” (ranked 194 with 12.1 million views). Other notable films featured in the list were “OMG 2,” “Lust Stories 2,” “Dream Girl 2,” and “Curry & Cyanide.”

In the television segment, “The Railway Men” ranked 139 with 10.6 million views. Other popular series included “Kohraa S1” and “Guns & Gulaabs S1” (both ranked 267 with 6.4 million views), and “Kaala Paani S1” (ranked 307 with 5.8 million views).

Globally, nearly a third of all viewing was for non-English shows and movies, with significant shares for Korean, Spanish, and Japanese language content. Titles from countries such as Germany, Poland, Mexico, Korea, Japan, Spain, and India also saw substantial viewership.

“The strength of Netflix’s storytelling all around the world: Our non-English shows and movies are very popular with audiences — making up nearly a third of all viewing: Korean (9% of viewing), Spanish (7%) and Japanese (5%) language stories captured the biggest share of viewing outside of English.

Stand-outs include Dear Child (53M) from Germany, Forgotten Love (43M) from Poland, Pact of Silence (21M) from Mexico, Mask Girl (19M) from Korea, Yu Yu Hakusho (17M) from Japan, Berlin (11M) from Spain, and The Railway Men (11M) from India,” the report states.

Overall, Netflix recorded 90 billion hours of viewing in the second half of 2023 and 183 billion in all of 2023. Various genres like drama, kids, comedy, action, and sports were well-represented, with reality TV, docuseries, and licensed titles such as “Young Sheldon,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Gossip Girl,” and “Gilmore Girls” contributing significantly to the platform’s extensive viewership.

“Leave the World Behind (our #5 most popular movie of all time) generated 121M views and Leo (our biggest animated film to date) 96M views — despite both premiering late in the second half. And Nowhere (our third most popular non-English language film ever) garnered 86M views,” the report states.

Additionally, the report reveals that fan favourites like "Wednesday" (98M views), "Red Notice" (62M views), and "Squid Game" (25M views)—the three most-watched titles ever—continued to attract millions of views in 2023, long after their initial releases on Netflix.

New adaptations also significantly boosted the viewership of earlier series: "One Piece" (72M views), our live-action TV show, more than doubled the viewership of the original anime film and series; and the reality competition spin-off "Squid Game: The Challenge" (33M views) increased viewership for "Squid Game" by 34%, three years after the beloved series first premiered.