Perplexity saw a sharp increase in downloads, active users, and mobile revenue in India after offering its Pro subscription free for a year to Airtel customers. As the earliest free subscriptions begin expiring, early data suggests the company has retained a much larger user base and increased spending, although it remains unclear how many Airtel users are deliberately converting into paying subscribers.
Perplexity partnered with Airtel in July 2025 to offer a free 12-month Perplexity Pro subscription, normally worth about $200, to the telecom operator’s 360 million customers. New redemptions ended on January 16, 2026, but subscribers kept Pro access for a year from the date they activated it.
The earliest users began reaching the end of that free period in July. Because subscriptions were set to renew automatically, users who did not want to pay had to cancel before their renewal date.
Downloads Surged During the Airtel Promotion
Sensor Tower estimated that Perplexity recorded 5.9 million app downloads in India in July 2025, up 625% from the previous month. That single month also exceeded the 5.4 million downloads the company had accumulated during the entire first half of 2025.
Across the seven months when new users could claim the Airtel offer, Perplexity recorded about 56 million downloads, more than nine times the total from the preceding seven months. Monthly active users rose from an average of about 2.6 million in the first half of 2025 to 8.9 million in July, before peaking at about 22 million in October.
Appfigures reported a similar pattern. Perplexity averaged about 11,200 daily downloads in India during the week before the Airtel promotion, rising to nearly 223,000 per day during its first week and about 305,000 per day between mid-September and mid-October.
Appfigures CEO Ariel Michaeli said downloads of ChatGPT and Claude remained broadly stable over the same period, suggesting Perplexity’s jump was closely tied to the Airtel promotion rather than a general increase in demand for AI apps.
Usage Remained Higher After New Redemptions Ended
Once new Airtel redemptions stopped in January, downloads declined sharply. Sensor Tower estimated Perplexity was downloaded 3.3 million times in India between February and July, more than 90% lower than during the previous six months.
Active usage declined more slowly. Perplexity had nearly 14 million monthly active users in July 2026, down 37% from its October peak but still more than five times its average during the first half of 2025.
Sensor Tower senior insights analyst Abe Yousef said continued usage had remained resilient despite the expected drop after the promotion ended. He said Perplexity still had significantly more users in India than before the offer.
Mobile Revenue Increased Despite Falling Downloads
Sensor Tower estimates that Perplexity’s in-app purchase and subscription revenue in India rose about 60% between February and mid-August compared with the period when the Airtel offer was available to new users.
From around July 18 through August 12, average daily in-app purchase revenue was 9% higher than during the preceding 30 days and 27% above the average for the first half of 2026. The data does not show whether those payments came from former Airtel users who intentionally subscribed, users who failed to cancel auto-renewal, or customers who were never part of the promotion.
Appfigures estimated that Perplexity’s monthly net mobile revenue in India increased from about $34,000 in January 2025 to $70,000 in December and $156,000 in July 2026. It estimated revenue of $878,000 during the first seven months of 2026, up 16% from the company’s total India mobile revenue for all of 2025.
Michaeli cautioned that the promotion’s visibility may also have attracted paying customers who never claimed the Airtel offer.
Perplexity’s campaign has since been followed by similar offers from other AI companies. OpenAI later made ChatGPT Go free for a year in India, while Google offered eligible Reliance Jio users 18 months of AI Pro access at no cost.
Featured image credits: Wikimedia Commons
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