Kantara Chapter 1 Box Office Day 4: Rishab Shetty’s Epic Crosses ₹200 Crore, Beats KGF 1 and Lokah Chapter 1

Rishab Shetty’s Kantara Chapter 1 has stormed the box office with a phenomenal opening weekend, collecting a staggering ₹223.25 crore across India. The film witnessed massive audience turnout throughout the weekend, with Sunday’s earnings alone touching ₹61 crore. With this, Kantara Chapter 1 has surpassed the domestic collections of KGF Chapter 1, becoming the third-highest-grossing Kannada film of all time.

Box Office Triumph

After a strong three-day run, Kantara Chapter 1 maintained its momentum on Sunday, marking one of the biggest weekends in recent memory. The film grossed ₹162.85 crore in its first three days, earning ₹46 crore on Friday and ₹55 crore on Saturday. As per Sacnilk, the film added another ₹61 crore on Sunday, pushing its domestic total to ₹223.25 crore.

Packed Theatres and Phenomenal Response

The Rishab Shetty-starrer continues to draw full houses, recording an astounding 98–99% occupancy for the Kannada version’s afternoon and evening shows in several Karnataka regions. The craze extended overseas as well, where the film earned over $4 million in its first three days — a remarkable feat for a regional release.

Beating Big Blockbusters

Kantara Chapter 1 has outperformed several recent big-budget releases, including Sitaare Zameen Par (₹167 crore), They Call Him OG (₹179 crore), and Lokah Chapter 1 (₹153 crore). Most notably, it has overtaken KGF Chapter 1 (₹185 crore), making it the third-highest-grossing Kannada film ever — just behind KGF Chapter 2 (₹860 crore) and the original Kantara (₹310 crore).

Praise from Industry Peers

Filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma showered praise on Rishab Shetty and his team, calling Kantara Chapter 1 “fantastic” on X (formerly Twitter). “All filmmakers in India should feel ashamed after seeing the unimaginable effort… the BGM, sound design, cinematography, production design, and VFX are mind-blowing,” he wrote, applauding Hombale Films for supporting such a grand creative vision.

About the Film

A prequel to the 2022 cult hit Kantara, Chapter 1 is set nearly a thousand years before the original story. Written and directed by Rishab Shetty, the film stars Rukmini Vasanth, Jayaram, and Gulshan Devaiah alongside Shetty.

The film’s end credits revealed the next installment, Kantara: A Legend Chapter 2, sending fans into a frenzy and cementing the saga as one of Indian cinema’s most ambitious mythological universes.