Rishab Shetty's Kantara Chapter 1 opens at ₹60 cr, beats Saiyaara, Chhaava

Kantara Chapter 1 storms the box office with a ₹60 crore opening day, surpassing major releases like Saiyaara and Chhaava, and emerging as one of the biggest pan-India festive hits of 2025

Rishab Shetty’s Kantara Chapter 1, the highly anticipated prequel to the 2022 blockbuster Kantara, has made a spectacular start at the box office. Released on Dussehra, the film isn’t just one of the biggest Kannada releases ever—it’s also among the largest pan-India festive releases of 2025. Early reports reveal that the movie raked in an impressive ₹60 crore on its opening day in India alone.

 

Released on October 2, Kantara Chapter 1 opened to a strong start despite its modest budget. While morning shows saw a relatively slow turnout, positive word-of-mouth from the premiere screenings quickly turned the tide, driving a surge in bookings for the evening and night shows.

 

Kantara Chapter 1 box office collection & occupancy

According to the Sacnilk report, on the first day of its release, Kantara Chapter 1 raked in ₹60 crore nett (gross less taxes) in India. A few of the year's top films, such as Saiyaara (₹22 crore), Sikandar (₹26 crore), and Chhaava (₹31 crore), have already been surpassed by Kantara in opening-day collections. 

 

The first day's earnings are outstanding, especially considering the film's modest budget of around Rs 125 crore.

 

"Kantara: Chapter 1" is estimated to have made between Rs 19 and Rs 21 crore nett in the Hindi belt. Depending on the number of screens, the number may rise. After Yash's "KGF: Chapter 2," which brought in an incredible Rs 54 crore at the box office, the Rishab Shetty-starring movie had the second-largest opening for a Kannada film in the Hindi market.

 

On Thursday, the Kannada version of the movie achieved an overall theatre occupancy rate of 88.13 per cent. The film's occupancy rates for the Telugu, Hindi, and Tamil dubbings were 75.34 per cent, 29.84 per cent, and 71.42 per cent, respectively.

About 'Kantara: Chapter 1'

"Kantara: Chapter 1" is a prequel to the same-titled movie from 2022, which Rishab Shetty wrote, directed, and starred in. Additionally, Rukmini Vasanth, Jayaram, and Gulshan Devaiah play important roles in the historical mythological drama. 

 

The film, which was produced by Hombale Films, has editing by Suresh Mallaiah, cinematography by Arvind S. Kashyap, and music created by Ajaneesh Loknath.