Digital advertising is booming, but why are Indian news publishers missing out?

When Australia implemented its landmark News Media Bargaining Code in 2021, it forced tech giants like Google and Facebook to pay for news content leading to an estimated AU$250 million per year flowing into the country’s media ecosystem. Within the first year, over 30 commercial agreements were reportedly signed, covering not just major metro outlets but also 84 small and regional publishers.

But in India, no such reckoning has arrived.

Despite a surge in digital consumption and digital advertising growing by 14% in 2024, reaching Rs. 45,292 crores (Pitch Madison Advertising Report 2025), Indian news publishers continue to lose ground and money to Big Tech. Revenue-sharing frameworks remain stuck in limbo, and most digital newsrooms continue to report flat or sluggish growth from their core offerings, especially text-based journalism. The platform pie may be expanding, but newsrooms are still scraping the plate.

Experts say many digital news outlets saw no growth at all in FY24, with only a handful managing 8–10% increases, mostly through branded content. When display advertising and brand solutions are combined, the overall industry growth remains at a modest 7–8%, a far cry from the optimistic forecasts painted in digital ad reports.

To understand this widening gap between consumption and monetization, it helps to look at the numbers.

A joint report by DNPA and EY for the year ending March 2024 highlights the imbalance.

While digital media (excluding e-commerce) generated Rs 41,469 crore in advertising revenues, digital news publishers received only Rs 2,345 crore, just 5.7% of the total.

That’s significantly lower than the 10–11% share they command on television. Subscription revenues don’t bridge the gap either. Digital news companies earned only Rs 212 crore through roughly 8 lakh subscriptions, accounting for just 8% of their total revenues. Consequently, only 56% of digital news outlets are currently profitable.

Programmatic rises, but digital news revenues remain fragmented

While the broader picture highlights the monetization challenges, a closer look at company-level disclosures reveals how fragmented the digital revenue landscape remains.

Many large network publishers do not publicly separate TV and digital earnings, but some financials accessed by e4m offer directional insight.

Times Internet Ltd (TIL), reported a year-on-year decline in advertising income from its online and digital media businesses. According to financial disclosures, TIL’s digital ad revenue stood at Rs 690.73 crore in FY24, down from Rs 709.73 crore in FY23—a dip of 2.7%.

Industry experts indicate that this revenue is almost evenly split between brand solutions, display, and programmatic advertising.

This pattern of partial visibility and reliance on estimated splits continues across several large networks.

Network18 continues to stand out as an outlier in the digital news revenue landscape due to the sustained performance of flagship platforms like Moneycontrol. As per the company’s Q4 FY25 financial disclosures that also highlighted annual trends, its news business generated an operating revenue of Rs 1,896 crore in FY 2025, reflecting a 4.3% increase over the previous fiscal. 

Out of this, an estimated 15% -20% is attributed to digital revenue, with a sizable share reportedly driven by brand solutions and programmatic advertising, according to industry sources.

On the other hand, annual reports of TV9 Network show that the company reported a total advertising revenue of Rs 602.35 crore for the year ended March 31, 2024. TV Today Network, which operates Aaj Tak and India Today, posted Rs 810 crore in advertising income during the same period, while NDTV earned approximately Rs 428 crore in ad revenue for FY25.

Even though a clear television-digital bifurcation is not publicly disclosed for these networks, sources indicate that digital comprises roughly 10-15% of their overall revenue. Within this digital share, programmatic advertising is estimated to contribute anywhere between 10% and 20%.

Even among traditional broadcast players, digital’s share, while still limited, is only beginning to show scale through programmatic monetisation.

For FY25, Jagran Prakashan’s digital business reported operating revenue of Rs 106.37 crore, marking a decline of 4.4% compared to FY24, where the figure was Rs 111.07 crore.

This downward trend reflects broader headwinds in platform dependency and shifting advertiser preferences.

According to Zee Media’s annual report, digital advertising revenue for the company stood at Rs 113.5 crore in 2023, up from Rs 106 crore in 2022, a modest 7.1% year-on-year growth.

Such growth, albeit gradual, underscores the slow but steady traction of digital advertising revenues across legacy news networks.

HT Media reported a digital revenue of Rs 211.87 crore in FY25, up from Rs 153.89 crore in FY24, a strong 37.7% year-on-year increase. Much of this growth, sources say, is driven by a mix of programmatic income, branded content, and a growing focus on direct digital sales.

Together, these snapshots highlight how digital advertising revenue in the news ecosystem is growing unevenly with programmatic playing an increasingly important, if still under-leveraged, role across traditional and digital-first publishers.

But isolated company performances don’t change the fact that the broader industry continues to operate without a clear framework for platform monetization. Unlike global counterparts, Indian publishers are still navigating an environment with limited regulatory backing and no formal revenue-sharing mechanisms.

Temporary deals, permanent uncertainty: Google’s one-time licensing push quietly fades

In the absence of a formal revenue-sharing framework, some Indian publishers had briefly benefitted from Google's News Showcase initiative, launched in India in 2021. It was a product experience for readers and a licensing program for news publishers.

Many industry insiders believe these one-time payouts were seen as a step toward compensating newsrooms, they were limited in scope, lacked transparency, and weren't backed by any regulatory requirement.

However Google states that since its launch, Showcase deals have been signed with 90+ partners representing 175+ publications in India, with many of these renewed in 2024. Showcase now covers 8 languages including Kannada, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Bengali, English and Hindi.

A stalled dialogue: Legal gridlock and industry apathy

e4m reached out to several major media houses to understand why the conversation around platform–publisher revenue sharing has largely stalled in India. However, most declined to comment, citing the matter as sub- judice, given the ongoing probe by the Competition Commission of India (CCI).

The case in question stems from a complaint filed in 2022 by the Digital News Publishers Association (DNPA), which alleged that Google was abusing its dominant position by monetising publisher content without fair compensation. The CCI initiated a detailed investigation under Section 26(1) of the Competition Act, and while preliminary findings acknowledged merit in the claims, the matter has since moved slowly through procedural stages. As of mid-2025, the case remains unresolved, with no clear timeline on when the Commission will deliver a final order, keeping the entire revenue-sharing dialogue effectively on pause.

However, several industry experts and domain specialists e4m spoke to offered a breakdown of the deeper structural issues plaguing the revenue model.

While the conversation around platform accountability remains stuck in regulatory bottlenecks, insiders point out that publishers themselves must rethink the fundamentals of their monetization models.

“We need to deep dive on the productivity and ROI of the investments being made, be it in human resources or AI-based tools. The majority of the traffic for any publisher today is from Web Stories and Google Discover. Both traffic sources do not allow direct ad monetization. Reliance on indirect revenue and syndication is a bane. The way forward is figuring out how publishers can increase direct advertising and reduce dependency on programmatic as well as syndication platforms,” the former digital head of a broadcast network with multiple dot com properties said.

Even as structural challenges persist, leading media executives remain cautiously optimistic about the opportunities ahead. Abhay Ojha, CEO of iTV Network (TV, Print, Digital and Sports League Business), acknowledged the digital momentum but underlined the revenue conundrum that continues to haunt publishers.

“Over the past few years, we’ve made significant strides in transforming our newsrooms for a digital-first world. Our investments in video production, SEO, social media distribution, and audience engagement have expanded our reach exponentially. Today, millions of users consume our content across platforms, often making us the first point of information for critical news,” he said.

Yet Ojha pointed out a critical mismatch. While audience growth has been exponential, monetisation models have not kept pace.

“The reality is that revenue models have not evolved at the same pace as audience growth. One key reason is that platforms have become the primary gateways to audiences, yet the monetisation frameworks tied to these platforms are still underdeveloped. Advertising revenues, while stable, face fragmentation as brands diversify their spends into programmatic, influencer-led campaigns, and emerging short-form platforms.”

Still, Ojha believes the tide could turn with more direct control and smarter monetisation strategies.

“That said, there’s a strong sense of opportunity. Branded content and native advertising have shown robust growth, and with sharper first-party data strategies and a focus on building direct-to-consumer relationships, we’re confident the gap between audience reach and revenue realisation will narrow significantly. This is a transitional phase, and the next few years will define a much more sustainable and balanced ecosystem.”

Much of the digital revenue today is concentrated in branded content deals and programmatic advertising, which together account for a substantial share of most publishers’ income. While branded content offers higher margins and stronger brand alignment, programmatic remains a volume-driven game with fluctuating returns. The challenge lies in striking the right balance—ensuring editorial integrity while scaling monetization through diverse, sustainable channels.

A senior executive from a leading English-language digital newsroom pointed out that while industry reports paint a bullish picture of digital ad growth, that momentum largely bypasses traditional news publishers, particularly those focused on text-based content.

“YouTube channels and IP-led video formats are monetising well, but our core offering which are news articles  is stuck at 5–8% annual growth, and even that’s limited to the biggest networks,” the person said.

They attributed this to a structural imbalance in how digital advertising is skewed toward dominant platforms like Google, Meta, and Amazon, which continue to capture a disproportionate share of spend.

“Programmatic has become a race to the bottom,” they added, highlighting that publishers have little control over CPMs and distribution, often giving away content to aggregators without compensation or meaningful traffic in return.

Many others agree.

Industry veterans also point out that Big Tech’s control over both the distribution infrastructure and audience access has left publishers with minimal negotiating power.

“The whole problem arose because big tech companies control both the demand side and the supply side of content distribution,” said Avinash Pandey, former CEO of ABP Network and a long-time advocate for media reform.

“When you own both the pipe and the platform, publishers have very little bargaining power in negotiations.”

He emphasised that while countries like Australia and Canada have made progress through government-led negotiations and policy reform, India’s response has remained slow and fragmented.

“The challenge is now compounded by artificial intelligence. These AI systems crawl through publisher content daily, rarely credit or compensate publishers, and end up presenting curated results directly shrinking our ability to claim visibility or revenue,” he said.

“Of course, the consumer will choose what’s convenient. But that makes it even more critical for the government to step in and ensure fairness.”

Pandey also pointed to the role publishers themselves must play. “If The New York Times can monetize every story it puts out, why can’t we? We must stop giving away content for free and also improve its quality. If we admit our content is sub-standard and nobody will pay for it, then we can’t keep blaming Big Tech.”

Way forward: building sustainable news models

Even as revenue-sharing negotiations remain unresolved and structural challenges persist, leading publishers believe the next phase of digital news growth will come from reinventing business models and reclaiming audience ownership.

Some experts believe that unless publishers reclaim control through direct sales, subscriptions, or collective negotiations  and unless there’s regulatory will, the monetization gap for original journalism will only widen.

Some are still optimistic that a course correction is possible.

“For us, it’s clear that long-term sustainability comes from diversifying revenue streams and reducing over. dependence on any single channel,” said Ojha.

“We’re actively building direct-to-consumer ecosystems, through subscription models, premium content offerings, and member-driven communities. While these models are still maturing in India, we’re seeing encouraging signals from audiences who value high-quality, trusted journalism.”

Ojha added that sharper data strategies and adjacent revenue verticals could bridge the monetization gap over time.

“First-party data is becoming a powerful differentiator. By investing in stronger data capabilities and proprietary tech platforms, we’re able to deliver richer, more targeted solutions for brands,” he said. “We’re also expanding into adjacent opportunities like events, educational initiatives, and digital commerce, which complement our core business and deepen audience engagement.”

In a fragmented ecosystem dominated by platforms and algorithms, Ojha believes the edge will lie with publishers who marry editorial strength with entrepreneurial innovation.

“The future belongs to publishers who innovate fearlessly and remain audience-centric. We are confident that with the right mix of editorial excellence and business innovation, Indian news organisations can unlock the full potential of the digital economy," he said.

The DNPA–EY report estimates that digital news could generate INR 3,980 crore in revenues by 2026, but that would still account for only a small fraction of India’s overall digital ad market.