Over the past six years, India has seen a major rise in crypto ownership, despite a historically negative attitude toward the sector from the government.
The country`s cryptocurrency market gained traction during the pandemic, causing the number of crypto users to snowball from less than 5-million in 2017 to over 206-million this year. This figure is expected to continue growing in the following years, with India reaching far more crypto users than the world`s top crypto markets.
According to data presented by BitcoinCasinos.com, India is expected to hit 328-million crypto users by 2027, or nearly three-times more than the US and the UK combined.
One of the key drivers behind the surging crypto adoption in India was the growing well-educated middle class searching for an alternative investment avenue in a country with a less-developed traditional financial system. The ease of crypto trading and potentially high returns have attracted many Indians to enter the cryptocurrency market.
According to a Statista survey, between 2017 and 2020, the number of crypto users in the country increased nearly four times, rising from 4,8-million to 17,8-million. Between 2020 and 2021, at the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, more than 60-million Indians started buying cryptos, pushing the total user count in the crypto market to 77,6-million.
Since then, another 130-million people have entered the crypto market, with the country reaching over 206-million crypto users in 2023.
The US, which generates nearly half the total crypto transaction value, worth $38-billion in 2023, hit 74,3-million users this year, almost three times less than India. Statistics also show India has 11-times more crypto users than the world`s third-largest crypto market, the UK, and 14 times more than Germany.
Statista expects India to remain the fastest-growing crypto market in the following years. Between 2023 and 2027, the number of crypto users in the country is forecasted to surge by almost 60% to 328,7-million. The US will see nearly 100-million crypto users and a 33% growth in the next four years. The UK and German crypto markets follow with a 25% increase, resulting in 22,2-million and 19-million crypto users, respectively.
As the fastest-growing crypto nation in the world, India also has the largest share of the global crypto user count. According to a Statista survey, the total number of crypto users hit almost 674-million in 2023, 244-million more than last year, and roughly 30% are from India. The world`s largest crypto market, the US, has an 11% share of the global crypto user count.
Statista expects the global crypto population to swell to nearly 1-billion by 2027, with the Indian market making up 33% of that figure.