The Indian influencer market is booming. Headlines like these are practically everywhere, and they are difficult to dismiss, given how many influencers seem to be rising every day.
Then you have official reports boasting about how the Indian influencer economy is already worth billions of dollars and is expected to grow several times larger.
The reports you could still ignore. What is harder to ignore is the envy that creeps in when you come across some 24-year-old casually talking about a brand deal that paid for their Bali trip, or a “day in my life as a full-time creator” video where the influencer is their own boss, works out of one trendy café after another while sipping matcha, and still ends the day with a screenshot of a fat bank transfer.
This is enough to make any regular person go, “Should I also be doing this instead of my soul-crushing, monotonous 9-to-5?”
This ‘dream’, though, makes it even more important to make everyone aware of the reality behind these glittering promises. And the reality is quite a bit more brutal than one would think.
India’s Booming Influencer Economy?
First, let us look at the actual numbers that most reports around us mention when it comes to India’s influencer or content creator economy. Now, the numbers themselves don’t lie, and there is clear proof that this sector’s economy really is booming.
According to the Press Information Bureau (PIB), the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), during the WAVES 2025 summit in Mumbai in May last year, released a report titled “From Content to Commerce: Mapping India’s Creator Economy”.
As per this report, “India’s creators currently influence over $350 billion in consumer spending annually – a figure expected to surpass $1 trillion by 2030.”
It also noted that “India is home to 2 to 2.5 million active digital creators, defined as individuals with over 1,000 followers.” However, many seem to read only up to here, with dollar and rupee symbols instantly dancing in their heads.
Many, though, don’t read the rest, which mentioned that “Despite the scale, only 8-10% of them currently monetise their content effectively”.
The report also stated that “The creator ecosystem’s direct revenues, estimated at $20–25 billion today, are projected to reach $100–125 billion by the end of the decade.”
A 2024 EY report projected India’s influencer marketing sector crossing Rs 3,375 crore by 2026, growing at 18% a year. It also found that a striking 86% of influencers surveyed expected their income to rise significantly within two years.
Business strategist Dhatri Bhatt, who structures brand-influencer partnerships, told ThePrint about a popular creator who went from charging Rs 30,000 a post to Rs 3 lakh a post within a couple of years, and said established fashion creators today routinely charge anywhere from Rs 75,000 to Rs 10 lakh per post.
Read More: Are All Influencers Actually Earning? Let’s Find Out
The Reality Check
However, the reality of this profession is not as glossy or glamorous as many are making it out to be.
Content creator Neha Tanti also spoke about the problems of the influencer profession in an Instagram reel from April 2026.
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In her reel, Neha talked about how influencers are posting dreamy videos about “Here is how I earned five lakh rupees with 10,000 followers in a month.”
She then asks them to stop, because “All you’re doing is giving false hope to people who want to start content creation. Like, stop romanticising a job where you do not get paid for 30 to 90 working days, where brands love to exploit you, where no one would listen to you and see you just as an asset who is digital.”
She then goes on to warn anyone who wants to become a content creator, stating, “And if you’re only starting this for money, please do not. I’m not even exaggerating right now because every day at 11:00 AM, I message every brand that I’ve worked with for the money that I have earned. It has been months. There’s no payment.”
She adds that, “On paper, it might look like I’m earning one, two lakh rupees per month, but you’re not actually getting the payment until 90 working f**king days. And it’s not just for big creators or small creators; it’s for everyone. It’s for the people earning 5,000 or people earning 50,000. It’s the same f**king sh*t.”
She goes on to say, how “Upar se, I am the one feeling ashamed for asking about my own money that I have earned to these brands and agencies, because they’re always like, “Oh, right now there’s a chitthi going on,” or, “No, no, no, right now it’s, like, the financial year ending, that’s why we’re not paying.”
It is coming from someone who was crying two hours ago because she was not getting her payments. And anyone who’s telling you that, “Oh, I earned 10 lakh rupees in a month at just 15K followers,” they are scamming you.”
Tanti also spoke about how, “Since I started content creation in 2023, I’ve gotten around ₹8,00,000 in deals, but of that ₹3,50,000 is still pending payment,” adding, “In the three years of doing this, only one brand has paid me on time. I’ve even chased an invoice for one and a half years.”
Sakshi Rawte-Dhar, a 28-year-old Goa-based beauty and lifestyle creator, also spoke to The Nod Mag, explaining the breakdown of her expenses and the lack of income that actually comes in.
Dhar, who has 54.6K followers, reportedly spends around Rs 6,000 just on subtitling software, with an editor costing her almost Rs 20,000 a month. Dhar, however, reveals that while all her expenses are going out, the brand deal payments she is owed are not coming in, stating, “If a brand confirms something in July, the deal is executed in August, and you get paid in October.”
Currently, she believes she’s owed somewhere around Rs 2,20,000 from brand deals completed in the last three to nine months. Several have also spoken about how difficult it is to get payments from brand deals, with Tanti saying, “We have to be mafias to get payments.”
Nainika, a 32-year-old Mumbai-based beauty content creator who runs the Instagram page @badassbrownbeauty with over 25,000 followers, also said, “Smaller creators command a high level of trust with their audience, so they have a bigger ROI, but they’re not as experienced, so brands are totally exploiting them.”
Such exploitation is allowed to happen because of how unregulated the influencer marketing sphere still is, with no labour law protections, industry norms, regulations, contract rules and more.
Nainika further added, “‘Barter’ is a misnomer that obfuscates the power imbalance. Brands are essentially asking for free labour. I can’t use products to pay my bills.”
Image Credits: Google Images
Sources: PIB, BCG, EY, ThePrint, The Nod Mag, Firstpost
Find the blogger: @chirali_08
This post is tagged under: Indian Influencer, Indian Influencer economy, content creator reality, influencer reality check, creator economy truth, influencer life reality, freelance problems india, influencer behind the scenes, social media career truth, influencer income, creator industry india, indian influencer reality, content creation truth, online career reality, digital creator life
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