Telehealth’s retreat: Why India’s digital health boom lost momentum after the pandemic

In the spring of 2020, as lockdowns emptied roads and hospitals struggled to maintain routine services, healthcare moved online almost overnight. Millions of Indians consulted doctors through smartphones and laptops. The Government of India’s Telemedicine Practice Guidelines, released that year, gave virtual consultations a regulatory foundation and telehealth appeared poised to become a permanent feature of healthcare delivery.

Five years later, that promise looks less certain.

According to Bain & Company’s Asia-Pacific Front Line of Healthcare 2026 report, telehealth penetration in India has fallen to just 10% in 2025, below even its pre-pandemic level in 2019. While most Asia-Pacific markets experienced a pandemic surge followed by stabilisation, India has seen a sharper reversal.

The decline does not suggest that digital health has failed. Rather, it exposes the gap between emergency adoption and long-term behavioural change in one of the world’s most complex healthcare systems.

The post-pandemic reset

Across Asia-Pacific, telehealth usage surged between 2019 and 2021 as patients sought alternatives to crowded clinics and travel restrictions. In markets such as China, adoption remained high even after normal healthcare services resumed, reaching 61% according to Bain’s survey of 6,300 consumers across nine markets.

India’s trajectory was different.

By 2025, only one in ten respondents reported using telehealth services in the previous year. Virtual consultations remained largely confined to follow-up appointments and relatively minor health concerns rather than becoming a routine entry point into healthcare.

The numbers point to a simple reality: many patients returned to clinics and hospitals as soon as they could.

Why patients still prefer the clinic

The answer lies partly in how Indians experience healthcare.

For many patients, a consultation is more than a conversation. It is the reassurance that comes from physical examination, diagnostic testing and direct interaction with a trusted doctor. The family physician remains an influential figure in healthcare decision-making, particularly when symptoms appear serious or uncertain.

Bain’s findings suggest that both patients and clinicians continue to view telehealth as a supplement rather than a substitute for in-person care.

Trust remains a significant challenge. Concerns around diagnostic accuracy, data privacy and the quality of virtual interactions continue to shape perceptions. As pandemic restrictions disappeared, so did much of the urgency that had driven telehealth adoption.

Clinicians have also become more cautious. Many doctors report increased administrative burdens associated with virtual consultations, making telehealth harder to sustain without stronger integration into everyday practice.

The economics do not yet work

India’s healthcare financing system presents another obstacle.

Unlike markets where insurers actively reimburse virtual consultations, India remains heavily dependent on out-of-pocket spending. Patients often see little financial advantage in choosing telehealth over an in-person visit. Providers face similar disincentives.

Fragmented insurance coverage and limited reimbursement support remain among the most frequently cited barriers to adoption.

The result is a digital service that offers convenience but often lacks a compelling economic case for either patients or providers.

The eSanjeevani paradox

Yet the story is not one of universal decline.

While consumer adoption in the private sector has weakened, public telemedicine has expanded dramatically.

The government’s eSanjeevani platform had delivered more than 338 million consultations by early 2025 through a network of over 131,000 Ayushman Arogya Mandirs. The platform has become one of the largest telemedicine programmes in the world.

This apparent contradiction reveals a deeper truth about telehealth in India.

Private platforms largely competed on convenience. eSanjeevani addresses access.

For patients in remote districts, virtual consultations can reduce travel costs, connect them to specialists and bridge longstanding workforce shortages. In these settings, telehealth solves a problem that physical healthcare infrastructure alone cannot easily address.

The contrast highlights a tale of two healthcare systems: one serving consumers who can often choose between digital and physical care, the other serving populations where digital access may be the only practical route to specialist services.

What comes next

Despite the recent decline, few experts believe telehealth’s role in India will disappear.

The more likely future is a hybrid model that combines virtual consultations with diagnostics, home-based care and seamless referral pathways into hospitals and clinics. Bain’s report identifies several areas that could accelerate adoption, including stronger insurance coverage, improved digital infrastructure, clinician engagement and wider use of artificial intelligence.

Artificial intelligence may prove particularly important. AI-enabled triage, clinical documentation and decision-support systems have the potential to reduce workload while improving efficiency and patient experience.

But technology alone will not determine the outcome.

India’s telehealth experience demonstrates that healthcare innovation succeeds only when it aligns with patient behaviour, provider incentives and system realities. The pandemic created extraordinary demand for virtual care. Sustaining that demand requires solving deeper challenges around trust, affordability and access.

The decline documented by Bain is therefore not a rejection of digital health. It is a reminder that adoption achieved during a crisis does not automatically translate into lasting change.

The future of telehealth in India may not look like the fully digital vision imagined in 2020. It is likely to be more practical, more integrated and more targeted. When that transition succeeds, telehealth could still play a central role in expanding access to care.

For now, the country’s experience offers an important lesson for health systems everywhere: technology can open the door, but only trust and utility persuade people to walk through it.