In August, Jio asked its customers to pay Rs 300 for a promise. Jio brought back its Prime membership for a one-time fee of Rs 300, which locks the price of eligible plans until 5 September 2027. No price hike was announced alongside it. That detail is easy to miss, but it says a lot. When a company sells protection from a price rise, customers start asking whether a rise is on the way.
Two months later, Jio Platforms went public. The offer was a fresh issue of up to Rs 30,213 crore, with a price band of Rs 1,065 to Rs 1,119 per share. Up to Rs 27,500 crore of the net proceeds is meant to repay some of the borrowings of Reliance Jio Infocomm, the company’s main operating arm. On 28 October the shares debuted at Rs 1,358, against an issue price of Rs 1,119, a premium of about 21 per cent. Demand was uneven. The institutional portion drew bids many times its size, while the retail portion was subscribed less than three times. Jio now has 542.4 million customers and a new group of shareholders who want to see revenue grow.
Nothing has been announced yet, and that needs to be said clearly. After the listing, Jio’s management told analysts that it will decide on tariff increases at the right time, depending on market conditions, and that it does not want to depend only on charging subscribers more. Analysts are less patient. One brokerage expects a smartphone tariff rise of about 15 per cent, which it puts at roughly Rs 50 on Jio’s Rs 299 plan with 28-day validity. It has pushed its expected timing to March 2027 from December 2026. That is a forecast, not a decision. The last across-the-board increase came in July 2024.
Why do analysts expect it? Higher tariffs would help Jio improve its return on capital employed and attract investors, analysts said even before the IPO. Rivals are already moving at the edges. In August, Airtel withdrew its popular Rs 299 prepaid plan, which gave 1.5 GB a day for 28 days. The nearest replacement, the Rs 349 plan, gives 2 GB a day and costs Rs 50 more. Analysts also say that ending unlimited 5G offers could lift Jio’s revenue per user without touching the headline price. That matters because Jio says 30 crore of its customers are on 5G, and about 56 per cent of its wireless traffic now travels on that network.
Now think about what a Rs 50 rise would mean, if it comes. A 28-day plan comes up for recharge about 13 times a year, so a customer who recharges without a gap would pay roughly Rs 650 more over twelve months. Jio’s Rs 299 plan already carries extras beyond data, such as an 18-month Google Gemini Pro offer that includes 5,000 GB of cloud storage. Still, for households that treat mobile data as a basic need, that is real money.
The Prime lock looks smart when you do the sums, but also less generous. Suppose the rise comes in March 2027, as that brokerage expects, and the lock holds until 5 September. A member would avoid the extra Rs 50 on six to seven recharges, which is roughly Rs 300 to Rs 350. That is about what the membership costs. The package also includes two Rs 300 vouchers, but one is for a new JioHome or JioPC connection and the other is for bringing in a new SIM for friends or family. If the hike comes later, or is smaller, the member gains less.
There is a deeper reason behind all this. Indians are using more data on Jio’s network. Average monthly use per customer rose 14.2 per cent to 44.2 GB in the September quarter. Over the same period, revenue per user rose to Rs 218.8 from Rs 211.4, an increase of about 3.5 per cent, and the company said promotions for fixed broadband customers held back the gain. Usage is growing much faster than revenue per user. Analysts say operators are now focusing on earning more from higher data use.
A rise carries risk. Jio’s monthly churn was stable at 1.6 per cent last quarter, and it added 9.1 million subscribers, so the base is still growing. But the last hike was followed by a dip. After the July 2024 increase, TRAI data showed Jio’s wireless customer count falling from 471.74 million in August to 463.78 million in September. That is why the timing and size of the next hike will matter as much as the hike itself.
Cheap plans helped Jio build a base of 54.24 crore customers. The next test is how prices rise, openly through new plan rates or quietly through discontinued offers. India got used to data that felt almost free. The coming months will show what it really costs.
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