India’s scooter market, which registered record sales of 8.11 million units in FY2026 and 1.43 million units in the first two months of FY2027 with strong 27% YoY growth (April-May 2025: 1.12 million units), is witnessing a growing battle between the top two players. While Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India (HMSI) remains unassailable as the longstanding segment market leader, the rapid advance of TVS Motor Co, particularly over the past three fiscal years, has seen a dynamic shift in the two companies’ scooter market shares.
While there’s little doubt that Honda will continue to rule this two-wheeler segment as it has done since the launch of India’s best-selling scooter – the Activa – 25 years ago, the market leader’s share has considerably reduced since FY2017. A decade ago, in FY2017, HMSI had a 57% market share, accounting for 3.18 million scooters of the 5.60 million units sold in India that fiscal.
Fast forward a decade, and Honda’s share of the much-expanded scooter market, which clocked a record 8.11 million units, has reduced to 39%, with dispatches of 3.16 million units comprising 2,845,052 Activas (110cc/125cc), 313,924 Dios (110cc, 125cc), along with 2,773 QC1 and 318 Activa-e zero-emission scooters. HMSI, which entered the EV market in early 2025, has not had much success with these two zero-emission models and has, till end-May 2026, dispatched 6,505 units of the Activa-e and QC1 and retailed 5,439 units.
India Scooter Inc’s strong growth over the past decade has been powered by Honda and TVS, albeit there has been a dynamic shift in the two companies’ market shares, with TVS benefiting from EVs.
As the decadal scooter wholesales data (shown above) reveals, HMSI maintained an over-55% market share from FY2017 to FY2020. The Covid pandemic-impacted FY2021 and FY2022, when all-India scooter sales dropped 11% YoY to their lowest level of 4 million units in the past decade, saw Honda’s share drop below the 50% mark for the first time in FY2022. Since then, as per SIAM’s wholesales numbers, there has been a consistent drop in HMSI’s share to 46.60% in FY2023, 43% in FY2024, 41.50% in FY2025 and 39% in FY2026. In the first two months of FY2027, HMSI, with 502,190 units (up 16% YoY), has a scooter market share of 35%.
The same 10-year period under review has seen the No. 2 player, TVS Motor Co, which currently has the Jupiter, NTorq and Zest in its ICE scooter stable and the iQube and Orbiter as EVs, gradually increase its volumes, albeit it is still some distance away from challenging Honda’s numero uno position. A close look at the narrowing sales gap differential between these two scooter makers reveals that from Honda’s truly massive 2.36 million-unit lead over TVS in FY2017, the gap has reduced to 859,366 units in FY2026, which, nevertheless, is a sizeable one.
What the numbers also reveal is that while Honda’s scooter market share has slowly tapered down between FY2017 and FY2026, TVS Motor Co’s scooter market share has doubled. From over 14% in FY2017, TVS ended FY2026 with a 28% market share. While the Jupiter and NTorq have been the key drivers of this growth, TVS’ fortunes received a booster shot with its entry into the electric scooter market. Between FY2021 and April-May 2026, TVS has registered wholesales of over a million iQube and Orbiter e-scooters. At 1,018,395 units, these two EVs account for 10% of the 10 million (10,024,451 ICE and electric) scooters that TVS has sold in the past decade.
Between FY2020 and April-May 2026, TVS has sold 1,018,395 electric scooters, which account for 10% of TVS’ overall scooter sales. In FY2027’s first two months, EV penetration has jumped to 19%.
A Million Electric Scooters Give Tvs a New Charge and Increased Market Share
TVS Motor Co’s rapid growth, particularly since FY2024, when it sold 1.4 million scooters, through to FY2026 with a record 2.30 million scooters, is the result of strong demand for both its ICE models and electric scooters.
In FY2026, TVS sold an additional 489,598 units, which has helped increase its India scooter market share to 28% from the 26% it had in FY2025. While the three petrol-engined scooters clocked 1,935,200 units, up 26% YoY, the two TVS e-scooters (367,501 units) posted 35% YoY growth (FY2025: 273,063 iQubes). This gave TVS an e-2W penetration level of 16%, improving on the 15% of FY2025. Last fiscal also saw TVS become the new e-2W market leader with a 24% retail share, unseating Ola Electric, which led for three straight fiscals from FY2023 to FY2025.
More recently, the Chennai-based manufacturer of the iQube and Orbiter EVs has become the second e-2W OEM in India, after Ola, to register 10 lakh, or 1 million, sales, news exclusively broken by Autocar Professional on June 11 this year.
As the TVS e-2W sales data table shown above depicts, of the cumulative 10,024,451 e-scooters sold from January 2020 till May 2026, 7.22 million units, or 72%, have been sold since April 2024, including a record 367,501 units in FY2026. This is reflected in the growing contribution of e-scooters to TVS’ overall scooter sales. From a minuscule 0.11% in FY2021, EV penetration touched 16% in FY2026 and, in the first two months of FY2027, it is over 19%, which also means that every fifth TVS scooter sold in the domestic market is a zero-emission model.
Of the 8.11 million scooters sold in FY2026, Honda and TVS together commanded a 67% share. Given the strong momentum in the current fiscal, FY2027 could likely see the 9-million milestone being breached for the first time. Will Honda manage to strengthen its grip on the market, or will TVS grab more scooter market share? Stay tuned as we regularly bring you the latest number-crunching news and analysis.
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