India had 700 million or more active Internet users aged two years and older as of December 2022, according to Nielsen's India Internet Report 2023.

Rural India had 425 million registered internet users, which was almost 44 percent higher than in urban areas, said the report, adding that urban India had 295 million active internet users.

The study also revealed there is a lot of room for growth in rural markets, as nearly half of the rural population is still not actively using the internet.

The active internet user base aged 12 years and older has grown more than 20 percent year-on-year to reach 595 million in 2022.

The report says that rural outshone urban areas with a growth of 30 percent in the number of active internet users.

Urban India, on the other hand, grew 10 percent. Further, female users grew by 27 percent, whereas male users increased by around 18 percent.

From a pop-strata point of view, the lowest pop-strata of below 100,000 towns and rural areas were the highest growth drivers.

The study further highlighted that nearly 90 percent of internet users were daily users. The gap between urban and rural also narrowed compared to the previous year, with 93 percent of urban and 86 percent of rural daily users using the internet daily.

As per the study, there were 450+ million monthly video watchers in India, with video watching and video calling being the top two online activities amongst those aged 12 and older.

Even though online banking and digital payments grew by a huge 43 percent, the study found that they still have a lot of room to grow.