India FDI inflows jump 73% to USD 47 bn in 2025

What UNCTAD reported for 2025

Foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows into India rose sharply in 2025, increasing 73% to USD 47 bn, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The assessment was published in UNCTAD’s Global Investment Trends Monitor released on Thursday. The report linked the surge to large investments into services and manufacturing, supported by policies that aim to integrate India into global supply chains.

The scale of the year-on-year increase stands out against a mixed global and emerging-market backdrop. UNCTAD’s preliminary estimates said global FDI rose 14% in 2025 to USD 1,600 bn. But for developing economies, overall inflows declined 2% to an estimated USD 877 bn, making India a notable outlier in the year’s data.

Sectors behind the jump: services and manufacturing

UNCTAD attributed the rise mainly to strong inflows into services and manufacturing. Within services, it specifically pointed to finance, information technology, and research and development as areas that saw large foreign investments. Manufacturing was also cited as a major pillar supporting the increase.

The report’s framing matters for how investors read India’s position in global capital flows. It suggests the composition of inflows is tied to sectors that connect directly with international production networks, digital activity, and corporate expansion plans, rather than being driven by a single one-off category.

Supply-chain integration policies in focus

UNCTAD said the investment momentum was supported by policies aimed at integrating India into global supply chains. The report did not list individual policy measures in the cited summary, but the direction aligns with India’s broader emphasis on attracting foreign capital into core services and manufacturing activity.

Separately, UNCTAD’s World Investment Report 2025 also described India as maintaining a liberalised FDI regime with automatic approvals in most sectors, alongside strategic limits and approval requirements in sensitive areas. The same set of details noted that sectors such as construction, industrial parks, telecom, e-commerce, trading, and railway infrastructure allow 100% FDI under the automatic route.

Data centres: India among the top hosts

UNCTAD also highlighted data centres as a concentrated area of foreign investment globally, with projects clustered in a limited number of countries. India was among the top 10 major recipients of data centre investments in 2025.

The report listed France as the number 1 host country, followed by the United States at number 2 and the Republic of Korea at number 3. It also noted that emerging markets featured prominently, with Brazil ranked number 4, India ranked number 7, and Malaysia ranked number 9 among recipient countries for major projects. Another UNCTAD reference in the provided material also included Thailand among emerging markets ranking in the top 10 hosts of data centre projects.

India’s data centre inflows in 2025

For India specifically, UNCTAD said that during the first three quarters of 2025, India attracted USD 7 bn in data centre investments, placing it seventh globally among recipient countries. The three-quarter timeline indicates the figure reflects investment captured through most of the year rather than a full 12-month aggregation.

This data-point matters because it places India within a small set of locations drawing large, infrastructure-heavy foreign investment, even as UNCTAD emphasised that data centre FDI is concentrated in a handful of countries.

How 2024 set the base for the 2025 surge

UNCTAD’s World Investment Report 2025 said India’s FDI inflows in 2024 dipped slightly to USD 27.6 bn, compared with USD 28.1 bn in 2023. Despite the marginal decline, India rose to 15th place globally in 2024 from 16th in 2023, and remained the leading FDI recipient in South Asia.

The same report pointed to strong investor interest in greenfield projects. It said India ranked fourth globally in 2024 with 1,080 announced greenfield projects. It also mentioned India’s estimated capital expenditure rising by more than a quarter to USD 110 bn, around one-third of Asia’s total, and said India remained among the top five economies for international project finance deals, with 97 such transactions.

Outward investment and digital services signals

UNCTAD also reported that India climbed in the global ranking of FDI outflows, moving to the 18th slot with USD 24 bn in outward investments in 2024, up from USD 14 bn in 2023. In addition, it noted a 20% increase in greenfield announcements by Indian investors, placing India among the world’s top 10 investor countries on that measure.

On the digital economy, the report stated that India attracted 22% of greenfield investment in digital services in the Global South during 2020-2024, making it the largest recipient within that group.

India within Asia’s and developing economies’ flows

UNCTAD said Asia attracted USD 605 bn in FDI in 2024, representing 40% of global flows and 70% of total investment in developing economies. In that context, India’s 2025 jump to USD 47 bn becomes more notable because UNCTAD’s 2025 snapshot also showed a 2% decline in overall FDI into developing economies to USD 877 bn.

The contrast underlines that India’s 2025 performance occurred even as the broader developing-economy pool of foreign investment softened.

Key numbers at a glance

Market impact: what the data implies

For India-facing investors, UNCTAD’s numbers place services and manufacturing at the centre of the 2025 FDI story, with finance, IT, and R&D explicitly highlighted within services. The inclusion of data centre investments, and India’s seventh-place ranking with USD 7 bn in the first three quarters, signals that large-ticket digital infrastructure is part of the inflow mix.

At the same time, the global backdrop matters. With global FDI estimated at USD 1,600 bn in 2025 and developing-economy inflows at USD 877 bn after a 2% decline, India’s 73% rise stands out as a divergence from the broader developing market trend recorded by UNCTAD.

Why this matters: grounded takeaways

Two elements are clear in UNCTAD’s framing. First, the inflow composition is tied to sectors that typically benefit from cross-border supply chains and corporate service hubs. Second, data centres are treated as a concentrated and competitive arena, and India is presented as one of the few emerging markets attracting major projects alongside Brazil, Thailand, and Malaysia.

UNCTAD’s earlier 2024 metrics also provide context for the jump. India’s 2024 inflows were lower than 2023, but the country improved its global rank and recorded high activity in greenfield announcements and project finance deals. Those signals help explain how 2025 could produce a step-up when large projects and sector-focused investments translate into recorded inflows.

Conclusion

UNCTAD said India’s FDI inflows rose 73% to USD 47 bn in 2025, supported by large investments in services and manufacturing and policies geared towards global supply-chain integration. The report also placed India seventh globally for data centre investments during the first three quarters of 2025, with USD 7 bn received. Future updates from UNCTAD’s regular monitoring and annual investment reporting will clarify whether the sector mix and data centre pipeline continue at similar levels.