Bharti Airtel Share Price Today Near Record High: Q2 FY26 Results, Rating Upgrades and 2026 Stock Forecast

Bharti Airtel Limited’s share price is hovering around record territory as of 5 December 2025, supported by strong earnings, multiple credit rating upgrades and aggressive bets on 5G, cloud and AI infrastructure.

As of early trade on Friday, Bharti Airtel was trading roughly around ₹2,100 per share, with intraday quotes between about ₹2,091 and ₹2,105. ^[1] Mint data pegs the company’s market capitalisation at about ₹11.9 lakh crore, placing it firmly among India’s most valuable listed firms. ^[2] Over the past five years, the stock has delivered a stellar 324% return, while the three‑month return stands near 12%, even though the last week has seen a mild pullback of around 0.5%. ^[3]

Behind this performance are Q2 FY26 earnings that showed nearly 90% year‑on‑year profit growth, continued leadership in average revenue per user (ARPU), and a visibly stronger balance sheet. At the same time, major global rating agencies S&P Global Ratings and Moody’s have both upgraded Bharti Airtel’s credit profile, signalling lower perceived risk and improved access to capital. ^[4]

Brokerages remain broadly bullish, with a consensus 12‑month target price around ₹2,290, implying high single‑digit upside from current levels, and more optimistic houses such as Jefferies projecting targets up to ₹2,635, suggesting upside of roughly 20–22%. ^[5]

Bharti Airtel share price today: near record highs after a strong 2025 run

Bharti Airtel’s stock is trading just a few percent below its 52‑week high of about ₹2,174.7, which it hit in late November 2025. ^[6] According to Economic Times’ liveblog, the stock was quoted around ₹2,103.7 in morning trade on 5 December, essentially flat on the day, after earlier prints near ₹2,094.2 (‑0.46%). ^[7]

Recent trading data show:

Daily move (5 December 2025): roughly ‑0.2% based on provisional close around ₹2,099.8. ^[8]
Weekly return: about ‑0.56%, signalling a small consolidation. ^[9]
Three‑month return: a robust 11.9%. ^[10]
Five‑year return: about 324%, underscoring a long multi‑year rerating. ^[11]

MarketWatch notes that as of Thursday (4 December), Bharti Airtel closed at ₹2,103.5, up 0.83% for that session, and still just over 3% below its 52‑week peak. ^[12]

On Moneycontrol, the stock’s 52‑week range is shown as approximately ₹1,561 to ₹2,174.7, with intraday ranges in recent sessions mostly between ₹2,090 and ₹2,115, suggesting a tight consolidation band near the highs. ^[13]

From a technical perspective, Bharti Airtel has also featured on scans for bullish RSI (Relative Strength Index) uptrends within the Nifty50 basket, indicating steady momentum even after its big run. ^[14]

Q2 FY26 results: profit surge and ARPU leadership

The immediate fundamental backdrop for the stock is Bharti Airtel’s Q2 FY26 (quarter ended 30 September 2025) performance, which surprised positively on almost every key metric.

Headline numbers

Multiple exchange filings and analyst reports highlight the following consolidated figures:

Revenue from operations: around ₹52,145 crore, up about 25–26% year‑on‑year. ^[15]
Consolidated net profit: roughly ₹6,792 crore, a 73–89% YoY jump depending on the profit definition used, marking the sixth consecutive quarter of profit growth. ^[16]
EBITDA: about ₹29,919 crore, up nearly 36% YoY, with margins expanding to around 57.4%. ^[17]
Total customer base: about 624 million across India and Africa, up roughly 11% from a year ago. ^[18]

ARPU and subscriber mix

Bharti Airtel’s biggest operational story continues to be premiumisation:

Mobile ARPU in India rose to ₹256 in Q2 FY26, up from ₹233 a year earlier (≈10% YoY) and well above key rival Reliance Jio’s recent ARPU (roughly ₹211). ^[19]
The company added high‑value postpaid and 4G/5G smartphone users, with smartphone data customers rising by over 22 million YoY and over 5 million QoQ, now accounting for around 78% of mobile subscribers. ^[20]
India mobile revenue grew about 13% YoY, driven by higher realisations and upgrades to more expensive plans. ^[21]

These trends are a direct continuation of the industry‑wide tariff hikes of July 2024, when Airtel raised mobile tariffs by roughly 10–21%, giving a structural boost to ARPU that S&P expects to continue at 6–8% annual growth over the next two years. ^[22]

Homes, digital TV and other segments

Beyond wireless, Airtel’s Homes broadband business remains a key growth engine:

Homes operations now span over 1,550 cities, with Q2 FY26 revenue growing about 30% YoY and net additions of nearly 951,000 customers, taking the base to around 11.9 million. ^[23]
Segment EBIT margin is reported around 16%, lower YoY due to expansion costs but still healthy. ^[24]

The company also continues to invest in digital TV and enterprise connectivity, and its digital platforms (cloud, payments, IoT, advertising) are showing strong double‑digit growth, though off a smaller base. ^[25]

Deleveraging and capex

On the balance sheet side, Q2 FY26 numbers and investor materials show:

Consolidated net debt (ex‑lease) of about ₹1.27 trillion, down from roughly ₹1.45 trillion a year earlier. ^[26]
Net debt / EBITDA (ex‑lease) improved to 1.19x, from 1.60x in the corresponding quarter last year, reflecting rising cash flows and disciplined capex. ^[27]
Quarterly capex of approximately ₹11,362 crore, still heavy but increasingly focused on 5G, fiber and data centers. ^[28]

In short, earnings growth, margin expansion and falling leverage are working together – a combination rating agencies like to see.

Credit rating upgrades: S&P and Moody’s turn more constructive

The most important structural news around Bharti Airtel in November 2025 came from credit rating agencies.

S&P Global: upgrade to BBB with positive outlook

On 17 November 2025, S&P Global Ratings upgraded Bharti Airtel’s long‑term issuer credit rating to ‘BBB’ from ‘BBB‑’, with a positive outlook. ^[29]

Key points from S&P’s rationale:

The upgrade reflects strong earnings momentum and cash generation that should drive continued deleveraging over the next 12–24 months. ^[30]
S&P expects Airtel’s India business to deliver 2–4% annual subscriber growth and 6–8% ARPU growth, supported by tariff hikes and customers migrating to higher‑priced data plans. ^[31]
S&P estimates that Airtel’s India operations’ reported EBITDA in FY26 will be about three times what it was a decade ago, highlighting the scale of earnings power built over time. ^[32]
The agency projects consolidated adjusted EBITDA of around ₹1.2 trillion in FY26, with 7–8% annual growth thereafter, and expects the FFO‑to‑debt ratio to move toward 45% over the next two years. ^[33]
Crucially, S&P states that Airtel’s rating is no longer constrained by India’s sovereign rating, which is also at ‘BBB’ but with a stable outlook. ^[34]

A positive outlook means a further upgrade is possible if deleveraging continues as forecast.

Moody’s: upgrade to Baa2, outlook shifted to stable

Earlier, on 4 November 2025, Moody’s Ratings upgraded Bharti Airtel to Baa2 (investment grade) and revised the outlook to ‘stable’. ^[35]

Moody’s highlighted:

Continued deleveraging driven by earnings growth and debt reduction.
Prepayment of about ₹260 billion of high‑cost deferred spectrum liabilities in FY24–25, which accelerated balance sheet improvement. ^[36]
An expectation that adjusted debt‑to‑EBITDA will improve from 2.3x in FY24–25 to around 1.8x in FY25–26, and further to 1.5x by FY26–27. ^[37]

Combined, these upgrades lower Bharti Airtel’s cost of debt, expand its investor base in global bond markets and reinforce the market’s confidence that high 5G and data‑center capex can be financed without overstretching the balance sheet.

Promoter stake sale, Nxtra Vizag and data‑center expansion

Not all recent headlines were about upgrades and earnings. Late November brought news of a promoter stake sale, followed by structural moves in the company’s data‑center arm.

0.56% promoter stake sale via block deal

A Sunil Mittal–led promoter group entity, Indian Continent Investment Ltd (ICIL), launched a block deal to sell about 0.56% stake in Bharti Airtel – 3.43 crore shares – for around ₹7,200 crore. ^[38]

The floor price for the block was set around ₹2,096.7, roughly a 3% discount to the prior close. ^[39]
News of the sale initially triggered a 1.5–3% intraday decline in the stock on 26 November 2025 amid a spike in volumes, before the share price stabilised. ^[40]

The company and media reports emphasised that the stake was placed with long‑term institutional investors, and that the transaction was part of the promoter’s capital allocation and portfolio rebalancing strategy rather than a strategic exit. ^[41]

Nxtra Vizag: new data‑center subsidiary linked to the AI hub

Around the same time, corporate filings disclosed the incorporation of Nxtra Vizag Limited on 28 November 2025 as a step‑down subsidiary focused on data‑center operations. ^[42]

Nxtra Vizag ties directly into Bharti Airtel’s strategic partnership with Google to build India’s first mega AI hub and data center in Visakhapatnam:

The AI hub, announced on 14 October 2025, involves an approximately $15 billion investment between 2026 and 2030, combining gigawatt‑scale data‑center capacity, subsea cables and clean‑energy infrastructure. ^[43]
Airtel and Google will jointly set up the purpose‑built data center and a cable landing station in Visakhapatnam to anchor new international subsea cables, while Airtel builds extensive intra‑city and inter‑city fibre. ^[44]
The Andhra Pradesh government has approved the allocation of about 480 acres for the Adani–Google AI data‑center campus, where Bharti Airtel, Nxtra Data and Nxtra Vizag are listed as notified partners. ^[45]

Taken together, the stake sale and data‑center moves suggest capital recycling by the promoter group alongside a substantial deepening of Airtel’s infrastructure and cloud‑services footprint.

Growth drivers: 5G, AI, cloud and Africa

5G rollout and premiumisation

Bharti Airtel has been one of the most aggressive 5G players in India:

As of early 2025, Airtel 5G Plus was already live in over 500 cities, supported by a multi‑year partnership with Ericsson and a parallel network expansion agreement with Nokia. ^[46]
Airtel has been shifting capex from 4G to 5G, betting that growing data consumption and the removal of ultra‑cheap 4G plans will push more users into higher‑value bundles. ^[47]

The industry‑wide tariff hikes of July 2024, combined with rising smartphone penetration, have already lifted Airtel’s ARPU from ₹233 in FY25 to ₹256 in Q2 FY26, and S&P expects this trajectory to continue. ^[48]

With 5G now available in the vast majority of Indian districts, the medium‑term thesis for Bharti Airtel is that data‑heavy, premium users will drive both revenue and margin expansion. ^[49]

AI hub and cloud ecosystem

The Airtel–Google AI hub is more than a headline partnership:

It positions Airtel’s data‑center arm Nxtra as a core infrastructure player for AI workloads in India, with potential annuity‑style revenues from hosting, connectivity and cloud‑adjacent services. ^[50]
Airtel has also entered a separate strategic partnership with IBM to augment its Airtel Cloud platform, creating a layered offering across connectivity, cloud and AI. ^[51]

These initiatives align Airtel with the broader wave of AI‑driven demand for compute, storage and bandwidth, and are likely to be key drivers of its enterprise and digital revenues over the coming decade.

Africa and mobile money

Through Airtel Africa, Bharti Airtel has a large and growing presence in 14 African markets:

In H1 2025, Airtel Africa’s net profit jumped about 375% to around $376 million, with revenue up roughly 25.8% to $2.98 billion, helped by improved currency conditions and strong growth in data and mobile‑money services. ^[52]
Mobile‑money revenue alone grew nearly 30% year‑on‑year, with underlying EBITDA expanding strongly across East and Francophone Africa. ^[53]

Analysts see Airtel Africa as both a growth engine and a diversification hedge, though it does expose the group to currency volatility and varied regulatory regimes.

New spectrum‑sharing rules and regulatory backdrop

On 5 December 2025, India’s Department of Telecommunications (DoT) proposed a new framework for one‑way spectrum sharing across bands and circles. ^[54]

Under the draft rules:

Operators will be able to share spectrum across different bands within broader categories (sub‑GHz, mid‑band, high‑band) rather than being restricted to the same frequency band.
This is expected to help struggling operators like Vodafone Idea and BSNL monetise unused spectrum, while enabling Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio to optimise their 5G spectrum footprint across circles. ^[55]
A small regulatory fee of 0.5% of spectrum cost will apply on a pro‑rata basis for shared spectrum, replacing a fixed fee. ^[56]

For Bharti Airtel, the proposal is broadly seen as a positive regulatory development, potentially allowing more flexible capacity planning and lowering the cost per unit of delivered data.

At the micro‑regulation level, recent disclosures also show occasional small penalties (on the order of ₹1–1.25 lakh) for subscriber verification lapses, which Airtel has accepted and paid, and the incorporation of Nxtra Vizag as a regulated step‑down subsidiary. ^[57] These are operationally minor but show an active compliance and disclosure environment.

Analyst ratings, target prices and valuation views

Consensus and individual targets

Across major brokers and data platforms, Bharti Airtel remains predominantly a “Buy” / “Outperform” idea:

Consensus target price: around ₹2,293, implying about 9–10% upside from recent levels, based on Trendlyne’s compilation of 21 reports from 8 analysts. ^[58]
Average broker stance: Mint data show the average rating as “Buy”, reflecting a broadly positive sell‑side stance. ^[59]

Recent, more detailed broker targets include:

Jefferies:₹2,635 target (raised from ₹2,500), Buy, citing a “broad‑based beat” in Q2 FY26, strong India Homes and Africa performance, margin expansion and robust free cash flow. ^[60]
Citigroup:₹2,225 target, Buy, after Q2 results that were ahead of expectations across India mobile, Homes and enterprise, supported by slightly higher ARPUs. ^[61]
CLSA:Outperform with a ₹2,285 target, pointing to above‑estimate growth in Indian and African operations and sustained ARPU momentum. ^[62]
Axis Direct:₹2,530 target, Buy, based on SOTP (sum‑of‑the‑parts) valuation and expectations of strong free‑cash‑flow generation. ^[63]
Motilal Oswal:₹2,110 target (June 2025 note), Buy, arguing that a 15% Indian wireless tariff hike and declining capex intensity in FY26 could drive nearly ₹1 lakh crore of FCF over FY26–27. ^[64]
JM Financial:₹2,050 target, Buy, set earlier in 2025 with a one‑year view. ^[65]

Aggregator platforms such as TipRanks also show a cluster of Buy/Outperform ratings with targets around the ₹2,000–2,300 mark from global brokers like CLSA and J.P. Morgan. ^[66]

Valuation debate

Not all models see substantial upside from here. A valuation site that compares Bharti Airtel’s intrinsic value to its market price currently classifies the stock as “overvalued” as of 4 December 2025, suggesting limited margin of safety at current levels. ^[67]

Given the stock’s 324% five‑year return, the market has already priced in a large part of the improvement story. The forward‑looking debate is less about whether Airtel’s fundamentals are strong (they are) and more about how much of that strength is already embedded in the share price.

Derivatives, technicals and near‑term flows

Options and derivatives data indicate that Bharti Airtel is a favourite in the December 2025 expiry series:

Recent reports flag heavy call‑option activity in the stock, reflecting speculative or hedging interest in further upside. ^[68]
There has also been significant put‑option trading, suggesting active positioning on both sides as traders manage near‑term volatility. ^[69]
On the futures side, some data providers label the current pattern as “long unwinding”, consistent with profit‑taking after a sustained rally. ^[70]

From a purely technical lens, the presence of Bharti Airtel among Nifty stocks showing RSI trending up suggests underlying buying interest is still intact, even as short‑term flows fluctuate around block deals and index activity. ^[71]

Key risks to the Bharti Airtel stock story

Even with strong fundamentals, investors watching Bharti Airtel into 2026 need to consider several risk factors:

Regulatory and policy risk
- Spectrum rules, AGR‑related litigation and new frameworks such as SIM‑binding or OTT regulations can affect profitability and growth. ^[72]
Competitive dynamics in Indian telecom
- While the market has consolidated into a three‑player structure (Jio, Airtel, Vodafone Idea), tariff competition or aggressive pricing to gain share could slow ARPU growth. ^[73]
Execution risk in 5G and AI investments
- The AI hub and large data‑center builds require multi‑billion‑dollar capex. Delays in ramp‑up, lower‑than‑expected utilisation or pricing pressure in cloud could affect returns. ^[74]
Africa and currency exposure
- Airtel Africa’s growth in data and mobile money is attractive, but the business remains exposed to FX volatility, regulatory intervention and macro shocks across multiple markets. ^[75]
Promoter and parent‑level leverage
- S&P and others have flagged relatively high debt at Bharti Telecom, the promoter holding company, which could in theory increase dependence on Airtel dividends. ^[76]

Outlook: What does 2026 look like for Bharti Airtel stock?

Putting everything together, the medium‑term outlook for Bharti Airtel hinges on a few central themes:

Earnings growth: Consensus expects continued double‑digit growth in revenue and EBITDA, driven by rising ARPU, premium subscriber additions, and steady expansion in broadband, enterprise and data‑center businesses. ^[77]
Deleveraging: If Bharti Airtel delivers on management and rating‑agency expectations, leverage ratios should keep improving, supporting further rating stability or even upgrades. ^[78]
Capex intensity: 5G and AI‑related investments will likely stay elevated, but analysts broadly expect free cash flow to ramp up as capex gradually normalises and EBITDA grows. ^[79]
Valuation: At current prices near ₹2,100, the stock trades close to, or slightly above, many valuation models’ fair‑value estimates. The consensus upside is moderate rather than explosive, reflecting a belief that Bharti Airtel has already made the transition from a deep‑value story to a quality compounder. ^[80]

For investors, the question is less “Is Bharti Airtel a turnaround?” (that phase is largely over) and more “How much am I willing to pay for a market‑leading, investment‑grade telecom and digital‑infrastructure company?”

As always, this article is informational, not investment advice. Individual decisions should depend on risk tolerance, time horizon and portfolio context.

Quick FAQs on Bharti Airtel share price and forecast

1. What is Bharti Airtel’s share price today?

As of 5 December 2025, Bharti Airtel is trading around ₹2,100 per share, with intraday moves of a few tenths of a percent and recent closes near ₹2,099–2,104. ^[81]

2. What is the 12‑month target price for Bharti Airtel?

Compiled data from Trendlyne put the average 12‑month target around ₹2,293, implying roughly 9–10% upside versus current levels. ^[82] Individual brokers range from around ₹2,050–2,635, with Jefferies, Citigroup, CLSA and Axis Direct among those with Buy/Outperform ratings. ^[83]

3. Why did Bharti Airtel’s promoter sell a stake recently?

A promoter entity, Indian Continent Investment Ltd, sold about 0.56% of Bharti Airtel via a block deal for roughly ₹7,200 crore at a small discount to market. ^[84] The sale is generally interpreted as capital recycling and portfolio rebalancing rather than a loss of confidence, especially as institutional investors absorbed the block.

4. What are the biggest growth drivers for Bharti Airtel going forward?

Key drivers include continued ARPU growth, 5G adoption, expansion of Homes broadband, scaling up of enterprise and cloud, the Google AI hub and Nxtra data‑center pipeline, and Airtel Africa’s growth in data and mobile money services. ^[85]

5. What are the main risks to the Bharti Airtel investment thesis?

Major risks are regulatory changes, competitive pressure from Jio and Vodafone Idea, execution risk on large capex projects, currency risk in Africa, and potential constraints from promoter‑level leverage at Bharti Telecom. ^[86]

References