India's Data Centre Boom: How Digital Growth Fuels 8-Fold Expansion by 2030

With Google’s $15 billion investment, India is positioning itself as a major global data hub.

According to estimates, India’s data centre capacity is expected to grow from the current 1.2 GW to about 8 GW by 2030, expanding at an annual rate of nearly 17 per cent, according to Trade Brains report.

This growth will make India one of the fastest-growing data centre markets in the world.

The surge in internet penetration and data usage has been a key growth driver.

India’s internet penetration has risen from 33.4 per cent in 2019 to 55.3 per cent in early 2025, with more than one billion active subscribers.

Average monthly data consumption per user has also tripled -- from 11.5 GB in 2019 to nearly 32 GB in 2025 -- thanks to the rollout of 5G networks, affordable data plans, and the growing popularity of streaming and online entertainment.

The increasing digitalisation of the banking and financial services sector, along with the rise of e-commerce and cloud-based businesses, has also pushed the demand for reliable data storage and processing facilities.

As AI applications and OTT platforms continue to expand, the need for large-scale, energy-efficient data centres has become even more crucial.

India’s data centre market has grown significantly in recent years, from a capacity of 590 MW in 2019 to about 1.2 GW currently.

The industry generated about $1.2 billion in revenue in 2024, and according to Statista, this figure is expected to jump to $11.53 billion by 2025.

At present, India has more than 260 operational data centres, with most of them located in major hubs such as Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru. MMR and Chennai alone account for nearly 70 per cent of the total data centre capacity.

Industry data from Anarock Capital shows that around 60 per cent of data centre clients are enterprises, 30 per cent are hyperscalers like Google, Amazon Web Services, and Microsoft, and the remaining 10 per cent are AI users.

With AI workloads growing rapidly, the demand from all three segments is expected to increase further.

Several global and domestic companies are expanding their footprint in India’s data centre ecosystem. Major international players such as Equinix, Digital Realty, NTT Global Data Centres, CyrusOne, and Meta Platforms are already investing heavily in the country.

AdaniConnex -- a joint venture between Adani Group and EdgeConneX -- plans to develop 1 GW of data centre capacity over the next decade.

Similarly, Digital Connexion, a partnership between Digital Realty, Brookfield Infrastructure, and Jio Platforms, is expanding aggressively. Other key players include ST Telemedia Global Data Centres, which has partnered with Tata Communications, Hiranandani Group’s Yotta Data Services, and Bharti Airtel’s Nxtra.

CtrlS also operates one of Asia’s largest Rated-4 data centre networks in major cities like Mumbai, Noida, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad.

- IANS