Battlegrounds Mobile India (BGMI)

Is BGMI safe?

BGMI is about as safe as other battle royale shooters for older teenagers, with two features most of them lack. Krafton's terms limit players under 18 to 3 hours of play and ₹7,000 of purchases a day, and the game runs on servers in India and Singapore. The risks are the usual ones for the genre: squads of strangers on open voice chat, random-reward crates, and a steady trade in stolen accounts. Its record includes a national block. India ordered the game off the app stores in July 2022 and let it back ten months later.

We score it 57/100, a little above PUBG Mobile (54), which India has blocked since 2020, and well above Free Fire (45).

How BGMI differs from PUBG Mobile

Both games come from the PUBG battle royale that Krafton, a South Korean company, created. Outside China, PUBG Mobile is published by Tencent's Singapore company, Proxima Beta. When India blocked PUBG Mobile in September 2020 over data sent abroad, Krafton launched Battlegrounds Mobile India in 2021 as its own, India-only game. TechCrunch reported in 2022 that Krafton had cut its publishing ties with Tencent after the 2020 ban and that over 100 million people had signed up in the first year.

The data handling reflects that history. BGMI's privacy policy, dated 20 May 2026, says personal information is stored and processed on servers in India and Singapore, with access limited to staff and contracted companies. The App Store description promises India-based servers for play. The two games still have separate policies, separate records and separate scores on this site.

The 2022 block and the 2023 return

At the end of July 2022 BGMI disappeared from Google Play and the App Store in India. Google said it had received an order and notified the developer. The government did not publish its reasons. Reuters reported that the game was blocked under section 69A of the IT Act, the same power India used against PUBG Mobile, and Krafton said it was seeking clarification.

In May 2023 the IT ministry approved a three-month trial return. According to Reuters, the junior IT minister, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, said Krafton had complied on server locations and data security, and that the government would watch user harm and addiction during the trial. The game has been on sale since. In September 2023 Inc42, citing Moneycontrol, reported that the government had given full approval after the trial, subject to quarterly assessments; neither the ministry nor Krafton has confirmed it publicly. This is one national block, lifted with conditions, and no fine. We count it against BGMI, but we do not count the 2020 PUBG Mobile block, which named a different app and publisher.

What data BGMI collects

Apple's India label is short. The only data listed as used to track you is user content, and linked to your identity are gameplay content, customer support records and user and device IDs. Google Play's data safety section says no data is shared with other companies, but lists device IDs and app activity collected for analytics and advertising, plus phone number, email, approximate location and in-app messages.

The privacy policy goes further than both labels. It names Google Analytics advertising features, including remarketing and demographic reports, and says data goes to "third party mobile advertising applications to serve and display in-game advertisements". If you log in through Facebook or Twitter, Krafton receives your friend list; through WhatsApp, your phone number. Anything said in game chat, the policy warns, "becomes public information".

Voice chat and spending

BGMI's appeal is squad play, and squads are often filled with strangers talking over live voice chat. Apple's rating lists messaging and chat, user-generated content, loot boxes and infrequent realistic violence. Under-18 players must give a parent's mobile number, and the terms set the daily play and spending caps. Those protections depend on the age a child enters.

Krafton runs a vulnerability disclosure programme on HackerOne, but it pays no bounties and its scope covers pubg.com websites, not BGMI. The bigger day-to-day risk is account theft through fake free-UC offers, cheap skins and account sales.

How to set up BGMI for a teenager

1. Make sure the account shows your child's real age, so the 3-hour and ₹7,000 caps apply, and give your own mobile number when the game asks for a parent's.
2. Turn on purchase approval in Google Play or Ask to Buy on iPhone as well.
3. In the audio settings, switch the microphone and speaker off, or limit voice to friends your child knows.
4. Link the account to a phone number and email you control, and never share the one-time password.
5. Delete the account from Settings, then Account, if your child stops playing.

How we scored it

Scams and harmful content (48) is the weakest factor, reflecting voice chat with strangers, loot boxes and age limits that rely on what players declare. Regulatory record (60) reflects the 2022 block and its conditional lift. Transparency and control (66) is the strongest, helped by in-game account deletion and the under-18 play and spending caps.