Airtel users to pay more: All postpaid plans hiked by ₹50

Bharti Airtel, India's second-largest telecom operator, has raised prices of all its postpaid plans by ₹50, while adding a free international roaming benefit to the revamped plans.

The new tariffs came into effect on Thursday. Existing postpaid subscribers will be moved to the nearest higher-priced plan within a month, PTI reported citing company sources.

The ₹50 increase across all six postpaid plans translates to a hike of between 3 per cent and 11 per cent, depending on the plan. For instance, the ₹449 plan will now cost ₹499, an increase of around 11 per cent, while the ₹1,749 plan has been raised to ₹1,799, a hike of about 2.9 per cent.

The company said the new plans come with one complimentary international roaming trip every year, a benefit it values at ₹2,000.

The free roaming pack includes 5 GB of data, 60 minutes of calls, 25 outgoing SMSes and free incoming SMSes, and is valid for five days. Customers can activate the benefit whenever they choose. On family plans, every member is eligible for the complimentary roaming benefit.

“From October 8, 2026, customers can enjoy one international trip with free roaming every year with these new postpaid plans, along with all existing benefits,” Airtel said in a statement.

The latest hike comes after the last major industry-wide tariff increase in July 2024, when Jio and Airtel raised prices by around 10 per cent to 27 per cent, followed by Vodafone Idea. Airtel has consistently maintained that average revenue per user (ARPU) needs to rise to ensure the financial health of India's telecom sector. The company's ARPU rose 5.6 per cent year-on-year to ₹264 in the first quarter of the current financial year, from ₹250 a year earlier.

Prepaid plans also reshuffled
Airtel has also been making changes to its prepaid portfolio to push customers towards higher-value plans. In August, the company discontinued five prepaid plans — ₹299, ₹319, ₹579, ₹619 and ₹649 — that offered 1.5 GB of daily data along with unlimited calling. The entry-level ₹199 and ₹219 plans were retained. However, customers on the popular ₹299 plan seeking a higher daily data allowance were required to move to the ₹349 plan, effectively resulting in a price increase of about 16 per cent.

Airtel's top management has indicated that there is room to raise tariffs, particularly for plans offering unlimited data at lower price points, as the company seeks sustained ARPU growth.

Airtel had around 491.60 million wireless subscribers at the end of August after adding 2.11 million mobile users during the month, according to subscriber data released by the telecom regulator. Reliance Jio remained India's largest telecom operator, with 508.43 million wireless subscribers at the end of August.

The latest Airtel tariff revision also comes days ahead of the proposed initial public offering of Jio Platforms, which is widely expected to be India's largest IPO, with an estimated issue size of around $3.8 billion.