The ICC Men’s Champions Trophy 2025 has surpassed the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 by a staggering 23%, setting new viewership records in India. Its TV ratings have soared to the highest ever for a multi-nation cricket competition.
An incredible 110 billion minutes were spent watching the event live on JioHotstar and 137 billion minutes on Star Sports. India and New Zealand’s thrilling final in Dubai on March 9 attracted a record-breaking 122 million live viewers on television and 61 million on JioHotstar, setting a new milestone for cricket’s digital viewership.
Along with being the second-highest ODI in TV history (apart from ICC Cricket World Cup events), the final drew 230 million viewers, who watched for 53 billion minutes on both TV and digital platforms.
Jay Shah, the chair of the ICC, said: “The Champions Trophy made a spectacular comeback after eight years,
And the Indian audience has been tremendous, especially for the India-New Zealand final.
“The astounding viewership figures demonstrate cricket’s widespread appeal in India and how broadcasting ICC events in multiple languages can greatly increase fan engagement.” The Champions Trophy marketing strategy has proven to be successful, generating enthusiasm among both new and existing fan bases while enhancing the entertaining cricket action during the event.
Sanjog Gupta, CEO of Jio Star Sports: “This achievement is a result of the combined strength of the most popular and well-established multi-platform sports destination, the fan-focused storytelling style of the JioStar’mega-casts,’ and our superior technological capabilities.”
“A unique cohort-based marketing strategy that created a variety of tournament apertures to attract large, distinct audience segments with different persuasions across devices fueled interest in the tournament.” The supporters’ fervor and the Final’s surge in viewership were further fueled by India’s undefeated, championship-winning performance.
According to data given by the Broadcast Audience Research Council, the most viewed ODI match in India’s history was the high-profile league match between bitter rivals India and Pakistan, which drew over 26 billion minutes of linear TV viewing.
The ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 match between India and Pakistan in Ahmedabad had 19.5 billion linear viewing minutes, whereas the Champions Trophy match had 26.5 billion minutes. The chartbuster’s television rating was an astonishing 10.8% higher than that of the Ahmedabad match.
With superstar Virat Kohli scoring a historic six-wicket victory for the eventual champions, India continued to dominate Pakistan in international ICC competitions. The match, which was played to a full crowd in Dubai on February 23, was watched by a record 206 million people on linear TV.
The main reason for the impressive audience figures is because JioStar, the rights holders, made sure that there was extensive coverage, with shows broadcasting live in English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada on Star Sports and Sports 18 channels.
JioHotstar’s Max View feed, four multi-cam feeds, Indian Sign Language feed, and nine languages—English, Hindi, Marathi, Haryanvi, Bengali, Bhojpuri, Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada—were among the record 16 feeds that streamed the tournament live on digital platforms.
Through engrossing programming both before and during the tournament, viewers and fans were captivated by the high-stakes competition.
India
