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Bharti Airtel has discontinued few prepaid plans, including its entry-level daily data limit plan of INR299 (1GB/d, 28 days) across India, effectively making the INR349 (1.5GB/d, 28 days) as the entry-level “unlimited” data plan. Simplistically there is a ~17% increase in the entry-level unlimited plan; however, the actual flowthrough to ARPU is contingent on competitors following through on Bharti’s move and the proportion of data subs on the INR299 plan (which we believe would have reduced over the last few years due to the unlimited 5G offerings on INR349+ plans). We await the competitors’ response to Bharti’s move before we tweak our estimates. Prima facie, we believe select tariff interventions could potentially drive up blended ARPU by ~6-7% over the medium term through better monetization from pre-paid data subs (estimated to be ~73%/75% of Bharti’s subs/revenue mix). However, it also likely signals a further delay in an industry-wide tariff hike (vs. our current estimate of 3QFY27) and the recent price tweak is a way to mitigate some of the impact, in our view. Reiterate our BUY rating on Bharti with TP of INR2,335.

Bharti pricing tweaks could boost blended ARPU by 6-7% in medium term

* Bharti has discontinued its entry-level daily data limit plan (INR299/28d), along with a host of other plans (INR319, INR579, INR619, INR649, etc.) across India.

* Through the removal of select prepaid plans, Bharti has effectively raised the price of its entry-level “unlimited” data plan to INR349 (while maintaining its INR50/cycle premium to INR299 entry plan for RJio), an increase of 17%.

* We note that telcos (including RJio) had earlier rationalized the entry-level INR249 plan in Aug’25, which yielded mixed results across telcos.

* Given the unlimited 5G data offerings starting from INR349 and the surge in average data consumption (now at 34.4GB/month for Bharti), we believe the share of users on the INR299 plan would have likely reduced over the past few quarters. Further, we believe the users subscribing to the other discontinued plans would have been insignificant, which would limit ARPU upsides.

* The actual flow-through to ARPU from Bharti’s latest tweaks in pricing ladder is contingent upon the competitors’ replicating Bharti’s pricing moves and the quantum of users on the INR299 entry-level plan.

* Based on our workings, Bharti’s ARPU from pre-paid data subs (which account for ~73% of user base and likely ~75% of wireless revenue) stood at INR275 in 1QFY27 (having risen organically from ~INR259 in 3QFY25).

* The recent pricing tweak has effectively removed the tariff plans that were ARPU-dilutive for the pre-paid data subs cohort and raised the minimum ARPU from the daily data limit plans for 28 days to INR321. ARPU for the longervalidity daily data plans ranges from INR254 to INR316 (Exhibits 4 and 5).

* We believe these pricing tweaks should enable our estimated Bharti’s prepaid data subs ARPU to increase from current INR275 to INR300, a growth of ~9% for the cluster and ~6-7% organic upgrades in the blended ARPU in the medium term.

Broad-based tariff hike likely delayed; pricing tweaks to prevent earnings downgrades

* Bharti in its latest earnings call mentioned that premiumization remains a key driver of ARPU growth over the near term, and the change in tariff construct is an important lever for driving sustainable ARPU growth over the medium term.

* We believe the latest pricing tweaks are a step toward driving organic ARPU upgrades through select premiumization but signals a potential further delay in the broad-based tariff hikes (vs. our current estimate of 15% hike from 3QFY27).

* As noted in the past, INR10/month change in ARPU drives ~INR34b (or ~2.5%) change in Bharti’s consolidated EBITDA and ~INR75/share (~3.2%) change in our TP. We believe the pricing tweaks prevent near-term earnings downgrades, while the wait for broad-based correction in pricing architecture continues.

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