India recorded a 34 percent jump in tequila volumes in 2025, the fastest growth rate of any major market tracked by the drinks analytics firm IWSR, according to data cited by The Spirits Business and other trade outlets this year. The country's tequila category expanded at a compound annual growth rate of 32 percent between 2019 and 2025, and IWSR forecasts a further 13 percent annual rise through 2030.
The Indian surge came as the category's largest market, the United States, lost momentum. IWSR reported that US tequila volumes were flat in 2025 and are expected to dip slightly in 2026, even though the country still accounts for more than two thirds of global tequila volume. Jason Holway, senior research consultant at IWSR, said the timing of India's rise had worked in the category's favor, telling trade press that tequila's growing popularity in India coincided with a downturn in the US market that freed up supply for other markets.
The numbers behind the figure
IWSR's country by country breakdown, first reported by The Spirits Business and later detailed by Global Drinks Intel and other outlets, places India among a group of smaller markets now doing the heavy lifting for a category that has slowed at home. Nigeria posted a 2019 to 2025 volume CAGR of 48 percent, Turkey grew 19 percent with an 8 percent CAGR forecast to 2030, and Japan grew 12 percent with a 7 percent forecast CAGR. Colombia, flagged separately as a market to watch, grew 26 percent in the 2024 to 2025 period. Globally, tequila volumes rose at a 6 percent CAGR from 2019 to 2025 and are projected to grow just 2 percent annually through 2030, a pace IWSR analyst Jessica Ibarra said still reflects a category that has doubled in volume since 2019.
Separate market sizing firms put different dollar figures on the Indian opportunity, and the estimates diverge. Grand View Research valued India's tequila market at 431.1 million dollars in 2025, or 3.4 percent of global tequila revenue, projecting growth to 949.1 million dollars by 2033. IMARC Group, using a different base year, put the 2024 market at 600.1 million dollars and projected it would reach 1.68 billion dollars by 2033. Both forecast double digit compound growth, but the underlying market size estimates are not reconciled between the two firms, an indication that reliable, audited volume data for India remains thin.
Why India, and why now
Holway pointed to a straightforward supply and demand mechanism: as premium tequila sales cooled in the US, producers had more allocation to send elsewhere, and India absorbed some of it before local infrastructure could catch up. He noted that had India's demand spiked a year or two earlier, allocation shortages might have limited the growth. He also flagged a longer term risk to imported tequila's position: domestically produced agave spirits in India, priced comparably to imported tequila, are drawing interest from consumers who take pride in local products, a dynamic he said could become more significant over time.
India's tequila moment has also attracted domestic capital. In August 2025, Radico Khaitan, one of India's largest spirits companies, said it would take a 47.5 percent equity stake in D'Yavol Spirits, a venture backed by actor Shah Rukh Khan, his son Aryan Khan, and Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath, for an investment of up to 400 million rupees, or roughly 4.5 million dollars. The joint venture's first product is a luxury tequila expected to launch in the following months, with Radico Khaitan handling global marketing and distribution. Separately, actor Rana Daggubati and composer Anirudh Ravichander launched their own tequila brand, Loca Loka, aimed at India's urban cocktail drinkers, according to Storyboard18. Trade coverage has also pointed to rising sales of super premium bottles through duty free channels in Delhi and Mumbai as evidence the category is moving beyond its reputation as a party shot.
The supply side backdrop
India's growth is unfolding against a broader shift in tequila's cost structure. Agave prices in Mexico spiked to roughly 32 pesos per kilogram before crashing to around 5 pesos per kilogram by early 2024, a swing IWSR attributed to overplanting during the 2015 to 2022 boom years. IWSR's Jose Luis Hermoso said the resulting supply glut, expected to persist through 2030, could ease raw material costs meaningfully within three to five years, potentially supporting cheaper premium tequila exports into markets like India as agave that was planted during the boom becomes ready for harvest. IWSR also noted a split emerging within the category itself: US super premium tequila volumes fell 6 percent between 2024 and 2025 and are forecast to decline a further 5 percent annually through 2030, even as ultra premium tequila continued to grow, up 7 percent over the same period, albeit at a slower rate than in prior years.
What this means
The 34 percent figure describes a fast growth rate on a still small base, and none of the market research firms surveyed here agree closely on what that base is worth in dollars, a gap worth watching as more granular India specific data becomes available. Whether India's growth continues to depend on tequila diverted from a softer US market, as Holway suggested, or develops independent demand, will likely determine whether recent moves like the Radico Khaitan and D'Yavol tie up prove to be early positioning or premature.