The 25 Best Indian Albums and EPs of 2025 

From mixtapes by seasoned artists like rap maverick KR$NA that shut the haters up to gentle and meditative reminders to oneself by singer-songwriters like Tanmaya Bhatnagar, Anika, Ditty and Taba Chake, 2025 gave us stellar EPs and albums by seasoned and new artists alike. 

It’s clear in hearing these records that these artists have not only held the narrative value of an album in high regard, but also subverted formats and expectations when it came to narrative and sound.  Here are the best albums and EPs of 2025, in no order or ranking.

Hanumankind – Monsoon Season 

Even before “Big Dawgs” took rapper Hanumankind global, the Kerala-origin, Bengaluru-based artist was plotting a full-length album. When each of your recent singles is a smash, from “Genghis” to “Go To Sleep” to “Big Dawgs,” a mixtape may not be the best way to hold an audience’s attention in the streaming age. HMK didn’t care for that, and rightfully so, because each of these 12 songs was a gem encrusted into a crown. From star team-ups like Denzel Curry, A$AP Rocky and Maxo Kream to singers like Roisee and Rudy, Monsoon Season is a reintroduction to new fans and a deeper look for the day ones, sonically designed for adrenaline, introspection and grit by the rapper’s go-to producers Kalmi and Parimal Shais. 

Karan Aujla – P-Pop Culture 

Name a better team than Karan Aujla and Ikky in Punjabi music. The Canadian-Punjabi’s next move after songs like “Wavy,” “Tauba Tauba,” and “Softly” was highly anticipated, and acknowledging his place in the Punjabi movement, Aujla made P-Pop Culture. It cemented Punjabi pop as both a genre and culture that’s here to stay. Doused in good vibes and gangster energy alike, songs like “I Really Do…” and “For A Reason” get you into the groove instantly, as though Ikky and Aujla are throwing a dare-you-to-stand-still challenge that they’ll win every time. Ikky’s modern composing and production spans bright guitars, lofty hip-hop beats (“I’ma Do My Thiiing”), and grandiose, distorted synth (“Daytona”). There’s a little bit of all of that on “MF Gabhru!” — a song that shapes the new direction of Punjabi music.  

Sijya – Leather & Brass EP 

New Delhi producer, composer, and vocalist Sijya has had quite the journey, going from a fledgling electronic artist who also designed her own cover art to signing with One Little Independent Records (home to the likes of Björk) with her new EP, Leather & Brass. Her visual/graphic designer mind is clearly entwined with her artistry across six, mostly downtempo tracks. Degradation and decay are key sonic touchstones for Sijya, allowing her to wander on songs like “I Only Want To Crash.” Synth lines rear their head and crash out over Sijya’s abstract lyrics (“Rust,” “Why Do You Fight Me”), and the most accessible, rhythm-driven song is “Do I Know,” in which she asks, “Will it ever be enough? I don’t know.” It’s the kind of EP that can speak to anyone in existentialist dread, of which we can always use more. 

Anika – Five Foot Three 

In a year where Indian independent music searched for its distinct voice, Goa-based Anika’s Five Foot Three arrived with clarity and conviction. This seven-track debut, produced by Mumbai’s pop ace Tejas, establishes a vocabulary for vulnerability that feels refreshingly unpretentious. The title track excavates small victories that accumulate into selfhood, while “Tic Tac Toe” wraps sharp pop instincts in inviting warmth. There’s punchy rock with “Dancing With A Piscses,” while “Sex Is Overrated” and “19” are humorous and heartbreaking, often simultaneously. The former dismantles romantic mythology with wit; the latter champions friendship over materialism.

Tanmaya Bhatnagar – Phoolon Sa Dil EP 

Five years since her debut song “Kya Tum Naraaz Ho?,” singer-songwriter Tanmaya Bhatnagar has traversed continents, motherhood, and sonic experimentation. It all led to her Hindi EP, Phoolon Sa Dil, which distills tenderness into something vital — the joys, trials, and power of love. Produced by Dhruv Bhola and Amar Pandey, the title track’s swaying, atmospheric pop establishes the EP’s emotional core. “Kinaare” carries the hummable warmth of her brightest work, while “Noor” splits the difference between lullaby and devotion for her daughter. “Supriya,” a dedication to her mother, radiates unguarded love. “Zindagi” with its lo-fi textures and sampled vocals captures something cinematic, like a contented, sunny day smile. Bhatnagar reminds us to bask in the glow of this love, which she reminds us is essential

Sanjay Divecha – Leela

After decades shaping India’s guitar vocabulary, Sanjay Divecha turned inward for Leela, a nine-track acoustic meditation that’s been years in the making. It opens up a sonic portal like few other guitarist-composers in India can do. “When Mountains Meet The Sky” distills classical guitar to its essence, while “Afrika” carries melodies learned directly from Cameroonian master Andre Manga. The album’s tributaries run deep, from “Song for John Ji” honoring jazz-fusion titan John McLaughlin with Apoorv Petkar’s vocals, to the Bossa Nova-nodding “For Tom” featuring Vasundhara Vee’s wordless grace. There’s a spiritual intensity on “Path To You” and “Anandi,” featuring Anand Bhagat and Ananya Sharma, that you don’t often hear. If you consider the stirring title track that is spread across the album in two parts, Leela proves that in the right hands, an acoustic guitar contains multitudes. 

KR$NA – Yours Truly

When New Delhi rap star KR$NA calls Yours Truly a mixtape, he’s kind of underplaying the true power of the format. This 15-track statement is more of a masterclass in sustained excellence. Collaborating with producers Phenom and Karan Kanchan, plus heavyweights Raftaar, Badshah, Seedhe Maut, Yashraj, Awich, and Aitch, KR$NA demonstrates range without pandering. “Nothing To Prove” addresses release patterns with disarming honesty, while “Sensitive” with Seedhe Maut playfully takes apart performative activism. The Japanese-Hindi conversational flow on “Hello” and the boom-bap buoyancy of “Talk My Shit/Guarantee” are potential hall of fame-level cuts in terms of pen game. Yours Truly is KR$NA at his funniest, most vulnerable, and indefatigable, often simultaneously. 

Alva Kuuto – Alva Kuuto 

For years, Praveen Alva commanded South Indian stages with Tulu storytelling that needed no translation. With Alva Kuuto, the Mangaluru-origin band’s self-titled debut, that visceral energy finds its fullest expression across eight tracks that leap across any language barriers. Producer Varun Murali, drawing from his folk-rock pedigree with Swarathma, helps the band shape a sonic arc that swings from the playful “Ashana” to the wistful “Ee,” from the funky strut of “Gongey” to pumped-up fury on “Pukkele.” Alva’s throaty shouts and soaring guitar solos, particularly on “Pageyta Pugey,” channel Rage Against The Machine’s intensity without mimicry. This is a rare Tulu-language rock album that proves regional language albums can communicate universally through sheer sonic force. 

Agam – Arrival of the Ethereal

After eight years of meticulous crafting, Agam‘s Arrival of the Ethereal sees the Bengaluru sextet push their boundaries to exhilarating new heights, from the ferocious “Between Doubt and Destiny” featuring folk-metallers The Down Troddence’s Munz to the wedding anthem “Walk of the Bride,”  which has thousands singing along at every show. Ambitious collaborations with Grammy winner Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt on “Flight To The Summer Sky” and an 80-piece Czech orchestra elevate their already grandiose sound. Nearly 20 years into their journey, Agam proves their music — rooted in rich, underrated as well as popular traditional compositions and soaring through prog arrangements — is always going to enthrall across generations.

Hanita Bhambri – Shoharat

New Delhi-bred, Mumbai-based singer-songwriter Hanita Bhambri sheds her mournful singer-songwriter skin with ferocious intent on Shoharat, a gothic pop-rap manifesto born from rage, grief, and unfiltered honesty. Archiving her past work and emerging in full hater mode, Bhambri crafts darkly textured bangers like “Zillat,” “Kadva,” “Bhool Bhulaiya,” and “Bhediya,” which was written in 15 minutes after sobbing on a bathroom floor. Songs like the eerie “Daayan” sum up the middle finger she’s raised to toxic exes, fake friends, and an exploitative industry. There’s a necessary catharsis and reclaimed space in her sound and goth visual aesthetic that match the album’s potent fury. After years of being underestimated and silenced, Bhambri’s debut reclaims power through pure artistic defiance.

Meewakching – Bildungsroman

At Manipuri indie act Meewakching’s Bengaluru gig to promote their new album Bildungsroman in August, English as well as Manipuri songs were sung at full volume by the crowd, which really made you think about how this may not have happened for a Northeast indie act six years ago. Emerging from the chaos and uncertainty of conflict in their home state, Bildungsroman is, as the name suggests, a coming-of-age story amid it all. There are bittersweet, dreamy love songs like “Supermarket (Everytime)” and “Make Me Glad, Don’t Make Me Sad,” and more gutsy songs like “Anarcho Love Song.” The hyperlocal “Crabwalking In Imphal” is transportive and sees them try a bit of rap, and there’s a punch hidden in the sweeping shoegaze of “I Can’t Trust”: “I can’t trust the government/They, they let our people die young.” Conscious and carefree at different times, Bildungsroman takes us straight into the minds of Manipur’s young, who are perhaps saying they’re not so different from the rest of the world. 

Kavya – Hyperreal EP 

New Delhi-origin artist Kavya broke out beyond her pop, R&B, and singer-songwriter expectations on her second EP Hyperreal, which came four years after her debut EP Know Me Better. In some ways, Hyperreal – co-produced with New Delhi’s Goya aka Abhishek Sekhri – is another way to know Kavya even better, as a shapeshifting creative powerhouse. Sure, it has the experimental sonic palette that recalls the likes of Björk, but when you hear the gigantic bass and swiveling beats go over wistful, echoing vocals on “Felt,” it can best be described as sounding like Kavya. The futuristic pop of “Submission” is overwhelming, and there’s more mystique she offers on “Stolen Games,” which is maximalist without being over the top. Hyperreal is yet another reinvention from Kavya, and we’re here for it. 

OAFF – Between Flowers

Composer-producer OAFF, aka Kabeer Kathpalia, used the attention he got from film and mainstream pop projects to show the world his most personal narrative and experimental soundscapes yet on Between Flowers. Just shy of the 20-minute mark, you could debate whether it’s an album or an EP, but then, the artist also added a visual film to go with it, marking just how ambitious his solo dreams were. In the span of a year, he grieved the loss of his grandparents but also got married. Finding that life exists amid this spectrum, OAFF enlisted a stellar cast of voices. Sid Sriram elevates “Falling” as a perfect fusion between two shapeshifting artists. Amira Gill and lyricist Manreet Khara light up the shimmering Punjabi title track, while Vidhya Gopal injects soul into the slowly unfolding “Rooth Gaye” and Pratika Gopinath brings her distinctive vocal style to “Forever.” Divyam Sodhi starts Between Flowers off strong, with glitchy, upbeat electro-fusion on “Baalmaa.” 

Ditty – Kali 

Berlin-based, New Delhi-bred singer-songwriter Ditty channels folk tradition’s cynicism and satire into Kali, her politically charged second album that refuses to look away from the world’s ugliest truths. From confronting colorism and structural racism on the title track to questioning consumerism’s environmental toll on “Money,” Ditty weaves intimate confession with urgent activism. “Dunya (For Our Children)” stands as the album’s moral core, addressing genocide in Palestine while drawing parallels to humanity’s war on nature with unflinching clarity. Produced with Bowls and pressed on recycled vinyl, Kali balances bleakness with Ditty’s hope that humanity might yet change its ways. It’s conscious folk music for an unconscious age, delivered with grace and fire.

Shikriwal – Natya Alaapika

Shikriwal is building a world of his own. And it’s not like he started yesterday. His album Natya Alaapika is a polished, resolute, and powerful release that comes on the back of years of showing people what Bhojpuri music can also sound like. Across 18 tracks and the span of an hour, Shikriwal proves why he can be Indian hip-hop’s next favorite rapper. Rapping like he’s often speaking directly to the listener about relationships and family, there’s different sonic approaches that make Natya Alaapika shine. Take the campfire jam vibes of “Kuiya Koop,” the resplendently confident “Kaaya” and “Kajri Geet,” and the chaos of tracks like “Vyapar” and “Tanashahi.” There’s a powerful directness to “Mahabharat,” with all the tracks building off a bed of woodwinds, horn and unpredictable production choices. He even squeezes in a Birthday song, “Janamdin,” that can just take you to the room (or road procession) where Shikriwal is throwing a genre-bending hip-hop party that draws from Bhojpuri music’s daring experimentation and adds a new chapter. 

Shauharty – Farookh 

As we noted earlier this year, New Delhi artist Shauharty’s Farookh is proof that alternative hip-hop can thrive outside India’s commercial rap lanes. Named after Egypt’s King Farouk and split into sides examining ego versus acceptance, this 14-track mixtape journeys from braggadocious narcissism to vulnerable queer identity with unflinching honesty. The psychedelic “Earth, Wind & Fire” confronts trauma and abuse over hazy beats, while “Stancyk!” enlists Kashmiri rapper Ahmer for a trippy fever dream. Blending jazz, funk, indie songwriting, and multilingual flows across Hindi, Marathi and English, Shauharty constructs an immersive world inspired by the likes of Kanye and Tyler, The Creator. Farookh represents self-acceptance as a radical artistic statement.

Dhanji, Rasla – Drive-in Cinema 2.1 

Mining ideas that have been kicking about for about eight to ten years, Ahmedabad maverick Dhanji and producer Rasla’s Drive-In Cinema 2.1 is a beautifully chaotic testament to desi hip-hop’s outsider spirit. This 18-track mixtape stitches together verses, beats and ideas from different eras of Dhanji’s journey into something defiantly unpolished. From the freestyle energy of “Hashishbhai” (a live staple that’s a moshpit-starter) to the pure chaos of closer “Bhool Mat Jana,” where overlapping vocals and roughness remain intentionally intact, this album is arguably a watershed moment when it comes to defining how well hip-hop as an adopted culture is constantly evolving across India’s subcultures.

Bloodywood – Nu Delhi

Bloodywood’s love letter to home on Nu Delhi, their second album, was exemplary of how a global breakout act from India can continue to surge forward. The folk-metallers take aim at haters with gnarly beatdowns on “Hutt,” raise slogans and fists on “Halla Bol,” and profess that Delhi has made them who they are. Uplifting, emotional rap-metal has always been Bloodywood’s forte, and songs like “Kismat,” “Bekhauf” (featuring none other than kawaii metal act Babymetal singing in Japanese and Hindi), and “Dhadak” are both familiar and hard-hitting in a way they haven’t done before. When you have more listeners around the world than in India, it can always be tricky to put forward multicultural, multi-faceted stories honestly. But if you can have fun with food puns and also invoke a mother’s love like they do on “Tadka,” you know exactly why Bloodywood are making fans everywhere they go. As Raoul Kerr raps, “We gonna win it even though we didn’t plan this.” 

Taba Chake – Khud Ko Miloon

Arunachal Pradesh singer-songwriter Taba Chake’s second album, Khud Ko Miloon, came about six years after his breakout debut Bombay Dreams. While that was about trying to make a new home while staying rooted, Khud Ko Miloon clearly comes from more time back home in Arunachal, and trying to find himself. Across 10 tracks (and adding three ‘raw’ versions for a full 13), Taba effortlessly pulls off the chill, introspective guy (the instantly hummable title track and the cheery “Kya Ho Agar”) but also offers refreshing indie rock turns on “Jee Le” and “Suno Dil Ki.” There aren’t songs in native Arunachali Nyishi or other dialects like previous projects, but Taba does return to his fingerstyle guitar roots on serene cuts like “Whispers In English” and the interlude. At a time when Indian indie has a lot of heartbreak stories, Khud Ko Miloon offers encouraging words like a friend who sits by you in your toughest moments. 

AFKAP – Parat 3 EP 

It was quite unorthodox for hip-hop artist AFKAP to release the third part of his soul-baring Parat record right after Parat 1 from 2023, but he did thankfully close the loop soon enough and release Parat 2 later in the year. The entire three-part project marks a shift in the outlook AFKAP has for life, and Parat 3 is where the artist gets fully real about how work has had him in a chokehold, and he finally breaks free from it in one of those cathartic rap songs of the year, “Resignation Later.” Beyond confessional themes, AFKAP remains a masterful artist who’s never tied down by a single style of hip-hop. From the pulsing fusion of “Mehek” featuring vocals by Kamla Devi to sampling a dialogue from the film Anatomy of a Fall to raging with Raga and Zero Chill on “Hurt” and reaching for that stadium-ready banger on “Dhyaan” with Stunnah Beatz, Parat 3 is a turning point and a focal point all at once. 

Farhan Khan – Alif Laila 

The year belongs to artists like Farhan Khan, who still believe in the narrative and thematic power of a concept album, in hip-hop in 2025, no less. Like AFKAP, the story didn’t exactly roll out in order (Part 2 came out in 2024), but that’s another subversion of convention by Khan, who mostly moved away from being a hardcore rapper and became more of a world-wise, heartsick poet with Alif Laila. With producers like Mr. Doss, Vedang, and Deetocx, Khan takes listeners back to first love, in its innocence as well as its intrigue. “Masoom” pairs qawwali and hip-hop like few others would’ve expected, and there’s a cinematic air to songs like “Raaz” and “Lifafa” without losing their hip-hop foundation. Part 1 of the album signs off with guitar noodling, sitar power from Mehtab Ali Niazi and Khan’s impassioned pleas to an already-departed lover. Khan made Alif Laila like he was acting, directing, writing and composing music for a film of his own, and it shows — the album is storytelling at its finest this year.

Sutej Singh – Restless | Relentless 

About seven years after his breakout album The Emerging, Solan, Himachal Pradesh’s guitarist-composer Sutej Singh proved once again he has a flair for epic-level prog on Restless | Relentless. At a time when guitar music is still a niche in India, Singh has certainly on the cusp of a global following, but he still deserves his flowers for championing the movement back home with surging experiments like “Kaadambari” (his first song to feature vocals, by artist Nandini Srikar). In swearing by mystique-building intros before riffs (“Bring To Light”), Pink Floyd-esque grandiosity (“Restless | Relentless”), and enchanting orchestral arrangements (“Mayflower”), Singh takes us on a journey like few other Indian guitarists. Yes, we have plenty of revered axemen in the country, but Singh represents a new generation who can pack story, soul, and wizardry all in one. 

Parvaaz – Na Gul Na Gulistan 

One of the last additions to the list this year, but certainly not the least, is Bengaluru-based band Parvaaz’s Na Gul Na Gulistan. Almost entirely hopeless about the future, Khalid Ahamed, Fidel D’Souza, Sachin Banandur, and Bharath Kashyap still persevere to find the light across eight punchy, shapeshifting tracks. Kashyap’s first album with the band leads to him bringing soul-drenched, sonorous guitar work right off the bat on the echoey “Talafi,” while “Dogma” has a nod to U2. They go from strength to strength on tenuous prog songs like “Zor-o-Zar” and soar like few others on “Khwab Gah,” and the standouts remain “Kauai’ōʻō” (featuring an unforgettable, flittering oud and a poignant sample of the last ever recording of a bird call) and the ominous, Radiohead-esque trip that’s the closing title track. Parvaaz have taken a look at the world around them and found little to celebrate, and that’s the most important thing that a rock band can do in 2025. 

Kayan – Is Love Enough? EP

Mumbai singer-songwriter and DJ-producer Kayan maps modern dating’s hope and exhaustion across five intimate tracks that refuse to offer easy answers. Opening with the breathy tension of “Denim Jeans” and moving through the amapiano-laced resilience of “Hold Me Down,” Is Love Enough? documents love’s unglamorous corners with restraint and specificity. “Good Kinda Love” blends seemingly Indian rhythms with nervous sweetness, while “Too Long” captures the fatigue of giving someone more time than they deserved. Kayan closes with “I’m Fine,” offering up a hook like an increasingly unconvincing prayer over Afrobeats-influenced production. What makes this 13-minute project especially affecting is Kayan’s willingness to sit with denial, disappointment and the messy in-between without making it about vocal acrobatics or production chops. 

Sen – Pages From The Past 

For all their bravado and badassery, rock artists often become reticent as they grow older. There was a bit of reluctance on Kolkata-bred, Goa-based artist Sen, aka Ananda Sen, to release his album Pages From The Past for fear that it was a little too personal. Made with his friend and extraordinary proponent for rock, Miti Adhikari (who passed away just days before its release) as well as former bandmates from The Supersonics and fellow Kolkata-bred artist Suyasha Sengupta, Pages From The Past has endearing chapters of a life well-lived and adventured. Meant to be heard in its entirety, Sen has now taken the album on the road (after being expectedly reluctant and cynical about being in the Indian indie scene), and it’s a shining tribute to Adhikari (the rock champion he was at heart) and maybe the closest we’ll get to a Supersonics reunion, and we’ll take that.