China has more than 93,000 cinema screens, a massive moviegoing audience and a proven appetite for Indian stories. So why aren't Indian producers building China into their filmmaking strategy?
India makes more films than almost any other country on the planet.
In 2025, 1,972 films, including dubbed versions, were released theatrically across Indian languages. Yet the country had just 10,033 cinema screens. That's approximately 6.8 screens per million people.
Now look at China.
In 2025, China had 93,187 cinema screens across 13,856 cinemas. Its urban theatrical market sold about 1.238 billion tickets and generated ¥51.832 billion (approximately $7.4 billion) in box office revenue.
That means China had more than nine times India's number of cinema screens in 2025.
India has roughly 1.4 billion people.
China has roughly 1.4 billion people too.
Yet one country has about 10,000 screens and the other has more than 93,000.
That is not a small difference.
It is a business opportunity worth thinking about.
But there is an even more interesting reason Indian producers should be paying attention to China.
Indian films have already proved that they can become extraordinarily successful there.
And that changes the question.
The question is no longer: "Can Chinese audiences watch Indian films?"
They can.
The better question is: "Why aren't Indian producers systematically making films that have the potential to travel to China?"
The 10,000-screen ceiling
India's theatrical market has a structural problem that doesn't get enough attention.
We make thousands of films, but we don't have enough screens to properly monetise all of them.
The FICCI-EY 2026 report puts India's 2025 screen count at 10,033, up only 1% during the year. India added 240 screens but lost 124, while screen density remained at only 6.8 screens per million people. EY describes this as extremely low compared with markets such as the US, UK, France and China.
And it isn't simply a matter of adding films.
If ten films are fighting for the same limited number of screens, releasing more films doesn't magically create more theatrical revenue.
The ceiling remains.
China has a very different theatrical landscape.
Its screen count reached 93,187 in 2025 after adding 2,219 screens during the year. China now has the world's largest cinema exhibition infrastructure.
That doesn't mean an Indian producer can simply send a film to China and watch the money roll in.
Far from it.
But it does mean something important:
The potential size of the theatrical prize is enormous.
And then came Dangal
Before 2017, the idea of an Indian film becoming a major commercial phenomenon in China would have sounded ambitious.
Then came Dangal.
The Aamir Khan-starrer grossed approximately ¥1.299 billion in China, around $190 million at contemporary exchange rates. It became an extraordinary international success, with its Chinese theatrical run contributing more than half of its worldwide gross by some reported calculations.
And Dangal wasn't an isolated event.
Secret Superstar followed.
It earned approximately ¥747 million in China.
Then came:
Andhadhun — about ¥325 million
Bajrangi Bhaijaan — about ¥286 million
Hindi Medium — about ¥210 million
Hichki — about ¥150 million
PK — about ¥118 million
Mom — about ¥113 million
Toilet: Ek Prem Katha — about ¥95 million
These figures are compiled from Chinese box-office data cited for Indian films.
Suddenly, something became impossible to ignore.
The Chinese audience wasn't responding only to gigantic Indian spectacles.
It was responding to stories.
The most important lesson isn't Dangal
It would be easy to look at Dangal and conclude:
"Chinese audiences love Aamir Khan."
There is certainly evidence that Aamir's popularity helped open the market. Chinese audiences had already encountered him through 3 Idiots and PK, and his recognition clearly became an asset.
But that explanation is incomplete.
Because then came Andhadhun.
A dark, twisty crime thriller.
No wrestling.
No giant sports spectacle.
No traditional Bollywood hero.
No expensive international-looking production.
Just an intriguing premise, escalating complications and a story that kept asking the audience:
What the hell is going to happen next?
It earned roughly ¥325 million in China.
That matters.
Because it suggests that the exportable quality of an Indian film isn't necessarily its scale.
Sometimes it is its story engine.
What does the Chinese audience actually want?
This is where Indian filmmakers need to stop guessing.
China is not a single "Bollywood-loving" audience.
It is one of the world's largest and most competitive film markets, dominated by Chinese films.
In 2025, domestic Chinese films accounted for 79.67% of China's total box office. Of the 51 films that crossed ¥100 million, 33 were domestic productions.
So an Indian film isn't entering an empty market.
It is competing against a powerful domestic film industry.
And that makes understanding audience behaviour even more important.
A 2025 Chinese consumer study found that the most preferred film categories included:
comedy — 37.9%
action/adventure — 33.95%
mystery/crime — 31.85%
science fiction/fantasy — 31.60%
The same research found that characterisation and emotional resonance were the most important considerations for audiences, followed closely by reviews and word-of-mouth, with story also ranking highly.
There is an important filmmaking lesson hiding inside those numbers.
Genre may get the audience through the door. Emotion and story may keep them there.
And Indian cinema already has some fascinating evidence to support that.
Why Secret Superstar worked
Secret Superstar is perhaps more revealing than Dangal.
The story is about a teenage girl who wants to become a singer while living with an abusive father. She hides her identity behind a veil and uploads her songs online.
On paper, this is a very Indian story.
But emotionally?
It is almost borderless.
A teenager wants freedom.
A mother wants her child to have a better life.
A young person wants to pursue a dream.
A parent wants to protect a child.
A family is trapped inside an unhealthy relationship.
Those emotions don't require a cultural user manual.
The film earned approximately ¥747 million in China, an enormous result for a relatively modestly budgeted Indian drama.
And Hindi Medium offered another clue.
The film revolves around parents desperately trying to secure admission for their daughter into an English-medium school.
Chinese media reported that the subject resonated because parents in China also face intense pressures around education and their children's future.
The film eventually earned around ¥210 million in China.
Again, no giant spectacle was necessary.
The conflict was enough.
The China pattern hiding inside India's successful films
Look across the Indian films that have travelled well in China and some recurring characteristics begin to emerge.
Family
Dangal.
Secret Superstar.
Bajrangi Bhaijaan.
Aspiration
A wrestler wants his daughters to succeed.
A girl wants to become a singer.
Parents want their child to get a better education.
A teacher wants to help students.
Social pressure
Education.
Gender expectations.
Family expectations.
Class.
Disability.
Social inequality.
Strong genre engines
Andhadhun brings mystery and crime.
PK uses satire and science fiction.
Mom uses revenge and thriller elements.
Emotional payoff
These films may begin with culturally specific circumstances.
But their emotional architecture is understandable almost anywhere.
That may be the real secret.
Don't make a film that looks Chinese. Make an Indian film that a Chinese audience can feel.
And that distinction matters
There is a dangerous temptation when filmmakers think about international markets.
They start trying to make an "international film."
Suddenly everybody speaks English.
The locations become generic.
The characters become culturally anonymous.
The filmmaker removes everything that makes the story distinctive.
And the film ends up looking like a cheaper version of something the audience can already get from Hollywood.
That's backwards.
Dangal did not become successful in China because it stopped being Indian.
It was unmistakably Indian.
Secret Superstar didn't erase its cultural setting.
Andhadhun didn't pretend Mumbai was New York.
They travelled because the human conflict travelled.
That is a crucial difference.
China is huge. But China is not easy.
Now for the reality check.
If this article simply tells producers, "Go to China," it would be irresponsible.
China is a highly regulated film market.
Foreign-film access is restricted, and industry reporting continues to cite an annual quota of 34 foreign revenue-sharing films. Foreign-film importation and distribution also involve state-controlled entities.
The Chinese market is also heavily dominated by domestic cinema.
And India's own China success story has not been continuous.
Geopolitical tensions, regulatory restrictions and changing import conditions have made Chinese theatrical releases for Indian films much less predictable than during the 2015–2019 period. More recent Indian releases have had selective opportunities rather than the broad pipeline seen during the earlier boom.
So China should not be treated as a guaranteed revenue stream.
It should be treated as a high-potential international market with significant barriers to entry.
That distinction is important for investors.
So should every Indian producer make a China-friendly film?
No.
That would be the wrong lesson.
The lesson is much more interesting:
Indian producers should start asking whether some of their films have international audience potential before they lock the film's business model.
Imagine two films.
Film A is a comedy built entirely around references, jokes and cultural situations that only work in one Indian state.
Film B is a thriller set in that same state, but the central question is:
Can a man prove his innocence before the person framing him kills again?
Film A may travel poorly.
Film B has a chance.
The location is Indian.
The conflict is universal.
That's the distinction producers need to understand.
The China Test
Before greenlighting an Indian film with international ambitions, ask seven questions.
1. Is the protagonist's desire universal?
Does the audience understand what the character wants without needing a cultural explanation?
2. Is the conflict immediately understandable?
If you remove the Indian names and locations from the pitch, does the central conflict still sound compelling?
3. Does the film have a genre hook?
Drama is valuable.
But drama plus mystery is stronger.
Drama plus comedy is stronger.
Drama plus sports is stronger.
Drama plus survival is stronger.
Genre gives the audience an entry point.
4. Can the story survive subtitles?
Some films depend heavily on wordplay.
Others depend on story.
The latter generally have a greater chance of travelling.
5. Does the film create curiosity about India?
The best international films don't erase their culture.
They make audiences curious about it.
6. Can the film work without a superstar?
This is perhaps the most important test.
Hindi Medium demonstrated that an Indian film could attract significant Chinese audiences without the conventional Bollywood superstar machinery. Its China opening even outperformed the opening days of Dangal and Bajrangi Bhaijaan according to contemporary reporting.
7. Is there a reason to watch it now?
A good story can travel.
A great story with a strong marketing hook can travel further.
Chinese producers should be looking at India too
There is another side to this conversation that Indian cinema rarely discusses.
Why should the relationship be one-way?
Why should Indian producers merely ask:
"How do we sell our films to China?"
Why shouldn't Chinese producers ask:
"What Indian stories could become major Asian film properties?"
India has an extraordinary supply of stories.
Thousands of years of mythology.
Multiple cultures.
Hundreds of regional traditions.
Urban crime.
Rural conflict.
Family dramas.
Sports stories.
Folklore.
Historical figures.
Social transformations.
Political history.
Contemporary youth culture.
And an enormous pool of writers, actors, directors, technicians and production talent.
China brings something equally significant to the table:
scale.
The two countries already have a formal history of film cooperation. India and China signed an Audio-Visual Co-production Agreement in 2014, and collaborations have included projects such as Xuan Zang and Kung Fu Yoga.
The next stage doesn't necessarily have to be about Indian actors appearing in Chinese films or Chinese actors appearing in Indian films.
It could be about something more commercially interesting:
Indian stories becoming Asian film IP.
Imagine the possibilities
A Chinese production company discovers an Indian thriller with a brilliant concept.
Instead of simply buying distribution rights, it invests in the production.
An Indian writer develops the story.
A Chinese partner brings financing and market expertise.
The film is designed from the beginning for India and selected international territories.
Or perhaps a Chinese producer discovers an Indian mythology-based concept and develops an animation or fantasy franchise around it.
Or a Chinese company partners with an Indian studio to remake a successful Indian thriller for the Chinese market.
Or an Indian crime story becomes a bilingual co-production.
The possibilities are much bigger than:
"Let's release a Bollywood movie in China."
The real opportunity is not Bollywood. It is Indian IP.
This distinction could define the next phase of India's international film strategy.
Instead of thinking: Film → India theatrical → OTT
think: Story → Film IP → India theatrical → China → other territories → OTT → remake rights → co-production → sequel → franchise
That is a different business.
And it changes how a producer should evaluate a screenplay.
The question isn't only: "Will Indians watch this?"
It becomes: "Who else could care about this?"
Don't chase China. Build films that can reach China.
This is perhaps the biggest lesson.
Indian filmmakers should not start stuffing their screenplays with things they believe Chinese audiences will like.
Don't manufacture artificial universality.
Don't remove Indian culture.
Don't imitate Chinese cinema.
Don't turn every protagonist into an international stereotype.
Instead:
Tell a specific Indian story about a universal human problem.
Make the character interesting.
Make the conflict clear.
Give the film a strong genre engine.
Create emotional stakes.
And make the story good enough that a viewer in another country doesn't need to understand your culture before they care about your character.
That's how cinema travels.
Dangal may not have been a miracle. It may have been a clue.
For years, Indian producers have focused heavily on the domestic box office.
Understandably.
India is one of the world's largest film-producing nations.
But the country's theatrical infrastructure remains surprisingly small for its population. In 2025, India had about 10,033 screens compared with China's 93,187.
That doesn't mean India should stop fixing its own exhibition problem.
It absolutely should.
But while India builds more screens, Indian filmmakers can also build something else:
more markets for Indian stories.
China has already shown what can happen when the right Indian film finds the right audience.
Dangal.
Secret Superstar.
Andhadhun.
Bajrangi Bhaijaan.
Hindi Medium.
Hichki.
These films came from different genres and had different budgets, stars and themes.
What connected them wasn't a single formula.
It was something simpler.
They gave audiences a reason to care.
And perhaps that is the lesson Indian cinema should take from China.
Not: "Make films for the Chinese market."
But: "Make films that deserve to cross borders."
Because the next big Indian box-office opportunity may not be another Indian city.
It may be another country.
And if Chinese producers are smart about the opportunity, they won't just be waiting for Indian films to arrive.
They may start coming to India looking for the next story worth taking to the world.
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