India received USD 129.4 billion in remittance inflows in 2024 — the highest of any country in the world, and a new record (Reserve Bank of India, 2024). Behind that number is one of the largest and most geographically spread diasporas on earth: Indians and people of Indian origin living in the United States, the Gulf, the UK, Canada, Australia, and across Southeast Asia, sending money home to parents, to households, to children's education, to the family property being renovated, to the savings account that is slowly becoming a business.
In the UK alone, there are approximately 1.86 million people of Indian origin — 3.1% of the population of England and Wales (ONS, Census 2021). They represent the UK's largest ethnic minority group. Many of them send money to India regularly. Many of them have been doing so for decades, through the same high-street banks their parents used, at costs that have fallen slowly and sporadically as digital providers have entered the market.
Why South Asia is the cheapest region — and where banks still over-charge
South Asia is the cheapest remittance-receiving region in the world, averaging 4.80% on a USD 200 send in Q1 2025 (World Bank, Remittance Prices Worldwide Issue 53, 2025). That reflects the volume of flows, the competition among digital providers, and the relative efficiency of the Indian banking system in receiving international transfers. It also reflects a baseline that has improved significantly over a decade of competition.
The improvement is real. The gap between the regional average of 4.80% and the traditional-bank average of 9.50% across all international sends (World Bank, Remittance Prices Worldwide Issue 53, 2025) is still substantial, however. A UK sender who has never moved away from their high-street bank is paying, in many cases, nearly double the regional average on every transfer. On a £400 monthly send — a realistic figure for a UK earner supporting family in Maharashtra or Tamil Nadu or Punjab — the difference between 4.80% and 9.50% is over £18 per send, or more than £220 per year.
The exchange-rate margin complicates the picture further. The quoted transfer fee may appear low; the rate offered for the GBP-to-INR conversion may be where the rest of the cost is recovered. South Asia's competitive average reflects providers who show the full cost transparently. The high-street bank rates reflect providers who do not.
India received USD 129.4 billion in remittance inflows in 2024 — the largest total of any country in the world. The UAE alone contributed USD 21.6 billion, or 19.2% of the total. The UK Indian diaspora of 1.86 million represents one of the largest non-Gulf sources of inflow.
— Reserve Bank of India, 2024; Khaleej Times, citing RBI data, 2025; ONS, Census 2021
The corridors within the corridor
Sending from the UK to India is not one corridor — it is many. The Punjabi diaspora in Birmingham sends to Amritsar and Ludhiana. The Gujarati community in Leicester sends to Ahmedabad and Surat. The Keralan nurses and healthcare workers in London and Manchester send to Ernakulam, Thrissur, and Thiruvananthapuram. The Telugu professionals in tech send to Hyderabad. Each sub-corridor has its own receiving infrastructure, its own mix of bank accounts and digital wallets, and its own practical realities for the family on the receiving end.
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