Bharti Airtel Q4 FY26 Results: Revenue Rises 15.7% YoY to ₹55,383 Crore, ARPU Reaches ₹257

The Bigger Picture

Bharti Airtel ended FY26 with a strong quarterly performance led by steady growth in India, a sharp contribution from Africa, and rising demand across its digital portfolio. The company’s growth was not limited to mobile services alone. Its homes broadband business, enterprise segment, data centre plans, digital financial services ambitions, and cloud-led infrastructure push indicate that Airtel is increasingly positioning itself as a wider digital services company.

The company’s India business continued to benefit from premium customers, higher data consumption, and better realisations. Airtel’s ARPU of ₹257 remains a key indicator of its strategy to focus on quality subscribers rather than only volume-led expansion.

Also Read: SBI Q4 FY26 Results: Net Profit Rises 5.6% to ₹19,684 Cr

Developments During the Quarter

During Q4 FY26, Airtel announced a US$1 billion investment in Nxtra Data Limited by Alpha Wave Global, Carlyle, and Anchorage Capital through their affiliates. The investment is aimed at expanding Airtel’s data centre network across India.

The company also announced a partnership with Google to improve messaging security and user experience through Rich Communication Services and spam protection.

In another major digital initiative, Airtel and Zscaler launched the AI & Cyber Threat Research Center – India, focused on strengthening cyber resilience and trusted AI adoption.

Airtel also announced plans to capitalise its NBFC subsidiary, Airtel Money Limited, with ₹20,000 crore over the next few years to expand access to digital financial services.

Gopal Vittal, Executive Vice Chairman, Airtel, mentioned that, " We ended FY26 on a strong note, demonstrating the power of our diversified portfolio. FY26 was an important year in our journey – we crossed the 650 million customer mark, launched our telco grade sovereign cloud, received RBI approval through our subsidiary to commence the lending business, and accelerated the expansion of our data centre footprint. We will continue to accelerate our investments towards building world class digital networks, future proof Airtel by putting AI at the heart and sharpen our portfolio for long-term growth. In addition a major focus for us is to completely eliminate diesel from our operations. We are working with Indus Towers to scale clean energy."

"Consolidated revenue for the quarter came in at ₹ 55,383 crore with a sequential growth of 2.6%. Africa had a stand out performance. India revenue, including passive infrastructure services, grew 0.9% sequentially, while Africa delivered a constant currency growth of 1.1% QoQ. India Mobile achieved sequential growth of 0.6%, despite two lesser number of days in the quarter. We added 5.8 million smartphone customers and 0.8 million postpaid customers, underscoring our focus on quality customers and portfolio premiumization. Our industry leading ARPU stood at Rs 257," he mentioned.

He also mentioned that, "The Homes business sustained a robust growth trajectory with sequential revenue increase of 9.5%, led by 1.1 million net customer additions. Our IPTV offering continues to gain traction delivering strongly on our convergence strategy. Airtel Business grew sequentially by 2.6%, driven by strong performance across our connectivity and digital portfolio. Our balance sheet strength is underpinned by disciplined execution and prudent capital allocation. At the same time, we believe further tariff repair remains critical to support continued investments and long-term value creation."