Every weekend, the 21-year-old student Lahana Jain opens Blablacar App to find a lift from Noida in the new suburbs of Delhi to the house in Kandhla, a small town in the northern part of Pradesh North State. The trip is 120 kilometers at a cost of ₹ 500, which is the equivalent of $ 6. This is a fraction of the 1,500- 1,000, or $ 17-$ 23, he will pay for a private cab.
“If you’re looking for a fast, efficient, efficient, and comfortable way to travel — and you like to chat — you should check it out,” says Jain, who has used the app 40 to 50 times over the past year.
Jain is one of the millions of Indians who long-haul is a cheaper, more accessible way to travel between cities. The surge has made India the largest market in the world, with an estimated 20 million passengers this year – nearly 50% from a year earlier. Based on these ingredients, Blablacar’s Indian Market will exceed 18 Million passengers projected in Brazil and the French domestic market.
For a company that closed its India office in 2017 after poor traction, the turnaround is striking.
Growth has been substantial without marketing or a local team, driven by word of mouth, expanding mobile internet access, and digital payment ownership and car ownership among India’s middle class.
India is home More than 700 million smartphone users and has seen a sharp rise in digital payments, which It now accounts for more than 99% of all transactions in that country.
In the middle of the shift is the government Building Change Change Change (UPI) Big (UPI) Big (UPI) Change (UPI) processed approximately 19.6 billion Transfers Worth around ₹ 24.9 trillion (about $284 billion) in September alone. Car sales climb in tandem, It reached 4.73 million vehicles In 2024, from 3.87 million years ago, it increased by 5.2% year-on-year and was all high.
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Other factors in Blablacar’s rapid growth in India include the country’s public transport capacity of more than 1.4 billion inhabitants, and the expansion of road infrastructure that is larger, and which is established between smaller towns and cities.
“We have many examples from users who say, ‘before, I flew to my destination or took the train or couldn’t walk,'” says Nicolas Brusson, and now I can drive.
Blablacar first sign in India at the beginning of 2015, set up a local office in New Delhi. The company soon faced stiff competition from Uber and its local rival Ola, both of which Experiment with Carpooling Services and a lot of marketing. (The company will stop suspending its carpooling service during the COVID-19 Lockdowns.)
Struggling to gain traction, Blablacar withdrew its local team in 2017. Still, the app lives on – and in 2022, usage began to rise again. Since then, it has skyrocketed from 4.3 million users in 2022 to represent 20 million this year.
Blablacar has reached around 1.1 million monthly active users in India, peaking at around 1.5 million in August. About three quarters are passengers, while the remaining 25% are drivers. India currently accounts for 33% of Blablacar’s Global Carpool passengers, the company said.
Trip-wise, Blablacar recorded the strongest growth in India, with 13.5 million trips completed as of September 30, up from 9.1 million in the previous year. Brazil remains slightly ahead, with 14 million trips this year compared to 1123, while France is the third trip with three years ahead of last year.
“For us, the center of gravity has moved from our initial markets in Western Europe to places like Japan, Turkey — and increasingly, India,” Brusson told TechCrunch.
Although Blablacar has yet to generate revenue from India, drivers on the platform earned around ₹713 million (about $8 million) in August alone, the company said. On average, drivers earn about ₹390 (about $4) per seat in India, with an average distance of 180 kilometers (about 112 miles).
By comparison, the average driver’s income is around 60 kilometers (about 155 miles). The difference, Blablacar said, reflects the purchasing power and reflects local costs in India.
Nearly 70% of Blablacar’s Indian users are between the ages of 18 and 34, and around 95% of activity takes place through the mobile app. About half of all riding in India, among the country’s 15 intercity routes, while the other half is outside the 150 larger corridors beyond the smaller metros. Among the busiest routes are Pune-Thane and Pune-Nashik in Maharashtra, Bengaluru-Chittoor in Andhra Pradesh, and a few others that give city centers their size.
“No rush” to start monetizing
Despite all this growth, Blablacar is not looking to enable Monetization in India anytime soon.
“We are not in a hurry to start introducing fees or generating revenue in India. We are focused on generating usage, and we have playback because we have played in several markets,” Brusson told TechCrunch.
However, Blablacar plans to set up a local office in India and make its first hire by the end of the year or early next year, Brusson said.
Blablacar does not see ride-hailing platforms such as Uber and Ola as competitors in India. Brusson described the product as a “Demand-LED product, while Blablacar, he said,” source-led. ” However, companies see people driving their own cars – or opting for the trains and buses that are available – as the main replacement.
Challenges on the road to success
Blablacar still faces some challenges in India.
State regulations surrounding Carpooling are ambiguous, which has brought the service to some cities. Some users, including Jain, have complained that it can be difficult to reach Blablacar’s customer support, which often sends messages automatically. The company told TechCrunch it operates a “mixed model,” with a local team that deals with the best day-to-day inquiries and a smaller group at headquarters and quality checks.
Blablacar introduced an ID check feature in India to verify users’ identities through government-issued documents – the tool then rolled out globally. However, TechCréwun discovered that users can still book or publish rides even if the ID check is incomplete.
“This is a deliberate design choice to encourage new members to join the platform,” the company said in response. “ID verification is one part of a larger framework of trust and safety; we don’t rely on a single feature, but on multiple, layered mechanisms that can be used to build trust in our community.”
The company added that more than 70% of trips in India are made with drivers who have completed government ID verification. Blablacar also displays user reviews and ratings and verifies accounts via phone number and email address.
“We actively encourage members to complete all verification steps, with a complete profile – with photo and ID – significantly increasing the chances of finding a carpooler.
Some Blablacar users in India also report frustration when drivers or passengers cancel trips at the last minute, sometimes after reaching the meeting point. Additionally, the app doesn’t have a location-sharing feature available, which Jain notes is used for those trying to book rides for family or friends.
Blablacar has adapted its product to suit Indian users, introducing features such as “meeting logic” to make coordination easier. Unlike in countries such as France, where carpooling zones exist in India, India has less choice areas. Drivers and passengers usually agree to meet at a convenient place along the route – a gas station, for example, or near a highway. The app now recommends and displays a mix of learning algorithms and user input, helping to reduce infrastructure costs and reduce infrastructure costs in India, the company said.
Sloblacally, Blablatacar expects around 150 million passengers this year, including users of the bus service, which is used in markets such as France but is not yet available in India. As blablacar breadens of small global players, India’s unexpected rise India has positioned itself at the heart of the next phase.