2025 has emerged as the year when Bollywood made a strong comeback amid the growing audience for regional films, OTT content and Hollywood movies. At least five Hindi-language films figure in the top ten list of highest-grossing Indian movies of 2025.
This includes historical drama Chhaava, spy-thriller Dhurandhar, romantic drama Saiyaara, action-thriller War 2 and comedy-drama Sitaare Zameen Par. The total earnings of these films have touched Rs 2,073 crore, which is 54% of the total collections of the top ten list of highest-grossing Indian films for the year.
Exhibitors earnings rise
More importantly, exhibitors estimate that 2025’s earnings at 12,257 crore has surpassed 2023’s record collections of12,226 crore, riding on Ranveer Singh-starrer Dhurandhar’s solid run, which is likely to close the third week of December with at least Rs 600 crore in domestic collections.
“Dhurandhar has touched 500 crore in domestic collections in two weeks since release on December 5. Word-of-mouth for the film remains strong. It has no significant competition in its third week in theatres. It could well cross Rs 600 crore in collections and may be do even better as the month ends,” Bhuvanesh Mendiratta, MD, Miraj Cinemas, a multiplex operator, said.
Experts on regional films
However, regional films, said experts, have held their own during the year, though not as dramatically as they have in the past few years. According to a report by consultancy Ormax Media, in 2025, Gujarati films collectively surpassed Rs 100 crore in gross box office collections for the first time, led by devotional films such as Laalo – Krishna Sada Sahaayate, thriller Vash Level 2, women-centric movie Umbarro, and family drama All The Best Pandya.
Malayalam cinema, on the other hand, had the spotlight on it for the second year in a row with blockbusters such as L2: Empuraan, starring Mohanlal, Lokah – Chapter 1: Chandra, and Thudarum finding success beyond the state in the year under review.
In 2024, survival drama Manjummel Boys, action entertainers Marco and Turbo (starring Mammootty), among others had raked in the moolah for the Malayalam film industry, popularly called Mollywood, helping it go mainstream, much like its Tamil, Telugu and Kannada counterparts. The Kannada film industry, popularly called Sandalwood, shone bright thanks to Kantara: A Legend Chapter-1, which grossed earnings of Rs 724 crore, emerging as the best-performing film at the Indian box office.
“Diversity of content has grown in the last few years as audiences have evolved,” Kunal Sawhney, chief operating officer and business development head, Cineline India, which runs the MovieMax chain of cinemas, said. “While audiences have been consuming film content across industries in the last few years, we are now seeing diversity of films within industries, which is interesting,” he said.
Ormax Media indicates the same, saying the top ten films of 2025 span a wider mix of genres, including action, romance, comedy, mythology and an animated feature film called Mahavatar Narsimha, which had earnings of over Rs 300 crore. 2024, on the other hand, was heavily driven by action and horror-comedy titles. Formulaic cinema is making way for more authentic storytelling, Ormax Media said, as audiences expect more rigour in film-making, editing and acting.
Dhurandhar, for instance, is making waves for doing away with familiar spy-film tropes such as rival agents falling in love, slick action entertainment, glamorous cars et al. The movie’s theme of an Indian spy infiltrating a Pakistani gang in Karachi’s Lyari area has deeply polarised audiences on both sides of the border, fuelling debate and discussion both online and offline, piquing interest and curiosity.
Exhibitors in Mumbai, Pune and Ahmedabad have responded to this overwhelming interest in the film with round-the-clock shows including midnight, post-midnight and early-morning shows.