Drishyam: The Conclusion becomes Ajay Devgn's biggest-ever opening day

Drishyam: The Conclusion, the Hindi-language third instalment built around Ajay Devgn's character Vijay Salgaonkar, opened in Indian theatres on October 2, 2026. According to trade estimates reported by The Week and India.com, the film collected ₹66.75 crore net in India on its first day, with a worldwide gross of ₹95.10 crore that includes roughly ₹15 crore from overseas markets.

The Week reported that the figure surpasses Devgn's previous personal best of ₹43.70 crore, set by Singham Again, making Drishyam: The Conclusion the biggest single-day opener of his career to date.

Where it ranks this year

India.com reported the film as the second-highest Hindi opening day of 2026, trailing only a film it named as Dhurandhar 2: The Revenge, which the outlet said collected around ₹99.10 crore on its opening day. ETV Bharat similarly placed Drishyam 3 as the second-biggest Hindi opening of the year behind a film it referred to as Dhurandhar: The Revenge, noting it overtook releases such as Border 2 and Mirzapur: The Movie. The two outlets differ on the exact title of the top-ranked film, a discrepancy not resolved in either report.

ETV Bharat reported the film ran across 13,749 shows on day one with gross collections of ₹84.76 crore, while India.com cited a higher show count of 15,759 and an overall day-one occupancy of 67.08 percent, with evening and night shows outperforming earlier slots. The two outlets' show-count figures differ, a discrepancy not resolved in either report.

Hindi version outpaces the Malayalam original

Drishyam: The Conclusion is a separate Hindi-language continuation written and directed by Abhishek Pathak, distinct from the Malayalam-language Drishyam 3 starring Mohanlal, which was released earlier in the year on May 21, 2026, and was directed by Jeethu Joseph, according to its Wikipedia entry. The Week reported that the Malayalam film earned ₹15.85 crore net in India and ₹43.37 crore worldwide on its own opening day, meaning the Hindi version's worldwide opening was more than double that figure. The Malayalam Drishyam 3 went on to gross ₹237.70 crore worldwide in its full run, per Wikipedia, becoming the highest-grossing film in the franchise's Malayalam line before the Hindi release.

The Week also traced the Hindi franchise's growth in day-one numbers: the original 2015 Drishyam opened with ₹5.85 crore net, and Drishyam 2 opened with ₹15.38 crore net in 2022, compared with ₹66.75 crore for the new film.

Cast, plot and critical reception

The film brings back Ajay Devgn as Vijay Salgaonkar alongside Tabu, Shriya Saran, Ishita Dutta, Mrunal Jadhav and Rajat Kapoor, with Jaideep Ahlawat and Prakash Raj joining as new cast members, according to ETV Bharat and India.com. A review by The Federal described the plot as centring on a fresh investigation into the Salgaonkar family's account of their son's disappearance, led by a crime-branch officer named Rajveer Singh Tomar, who challenges the family's version of events while Vijay works to keep his story intact.

The Federal's review praised Devgn's performance for its restraint, saying his character relies on "familiar minimalism, allowing small changes in expression to suggest constant calculation," and said Ahlawat brought a more confrontational energy as the investigating officer. The same review said the film was strongest in its courtroom confrontations and strategic plot reveals but criticised its pacing, saying the first half dwells on details whose relevance emerges only later while the climax moves quickly into what it called "twist-heavy spectacle." The reviewer noted the film does not simply reproduce the Malayalam continuation, but said it favoured plot spectacle over the emotional and psychological depth of earlier instalments.

What is not yet known

Day-two and opening-weekend figures had not been finalised in the sources reviewed for this article. Exact show-count figures and the title of the year's top-ranked Hindi opener also varied between trade outlets, and neither Devgn nor the production had issued an official box office statement beyond the distributor-estimated numbers cited by trade publications.