Bigg Boss Telugu winners list: all nine seasons

Kalyan Padala won the most recent season. He took Bigg Boss Telugu 9 at the finale on 21 December 2025, which makes nine winners across nine seasons since the show began in 2017. Season 10 doesn’t have a winner yet, and this list gets a tenth row after that finale.

Bigg Boss Telugu winners and runners-up by season

Most recent season first. The runner-up column is the first runner-up in each finale.

Bigg Boss Telugu winner prize money by season

If you assume ₹50 lakh is the standard, four of these seasons will surprise you. Every figure below is what media reported at the time of each finale. The channel doesn’t publish a prize breakdown, so treat these as reported amounts rather than official ones. Watch the last column, because in four of the nine seasons a finalist accepted a suitcase of cash and that changed what the winner actually took home. It’s also why you’ll see figures on other lists that don’t match these.

So why does the cash swing from ₹55 lakh down to ₹10 lakh? The suitcase. Late in a finale the host offers a finalist a fixed sum to step out of the race, and that money comes off the prize pool before the winner is announced. Season 6 is where it got strange. LV Revanth won the title with ₹10 lakh in cash while the runner-up walked out with ₹40 lakh. Five seasons escaped it entirely. The first three and Season 5 each paid out the full ₹50 lakh, and Season 8 paid more than any of them.

Who won each Bigg Boss Telugu season

Nine finales, and what actually happened at each. If you only wanted the name, the table above has it.

Season 9 (2025): Kalyan Padala

Kalyan Padala went in as a commoner rather than a familiar face. He came out with the trophy after 105 days, the first champion to come through the Agnipariksha selection route. Demon Pavan finished third by taking a ₹15 lakh suitcase, a finale choice rather than an eviction, and that money came off what the winner collected. Thanuja Puttaswamy was runner-up. If you want that finale in full, the Season 9 finale recap has it, and the cast list has all 22 who went in.

Season 8 (2024): Nikhil Maliyakkal

Looking for the biggest cheque in the show’s history? It’s this one. Nikhil Maliyakkal beat Gautham Krishna and took a reported ₹55 lakh with a car, more than any other Telugu winner before or since, and Ram Charan handed him the trophy.

Season 7 (2023): Pallavi Prashanth

Pallavi Prashanth finished ahead of Amardeep Chowdary, and his cheque shows the suitcase mechanic in plain arithmetic: ₹35 lakh rather than ₹50 lakh, because Prince Yawar had already taken ₹15 lakh off the top.

Season 6 (2022): LV Revanth

The odd one out. Singer LV Revanth lifted the trophy with ₹10 lakh in cash, while first runner-up Shrihan took a ₹40 lakh briefcase and left the race with four times the winner’s cash. The Siasat Daily reported that Nagarjuna told the finale audience Shrihan had drawn more votes than Revanth. So you’ll still see that season described as the one the runner-up really won. No vote counts were ever published either way.

Season 5 (2021): VJ Sunny

Nobody took a suitcase in 2021, so VJ Sunny kept the whole advertised amount: ₹50 lakh, a bike and a plot of land reported at ₹25 lakh. Shanmukh Jaswanth was runner-up.

Season 4 (2020): Abijeet Duddala

This is where the suitcase first bit. Abijeet Duddala won ahead of Akhil Sarthak, but Sohel had accepted a ₹25 lakh briefcase and left the finale race, and reports say that money came out of the ₹50 lakh pool. Hence a winner’s cheque worth half of what the first three seasons paid.

Season 3 (2019): Rahul Sipligunj

Nagarjuna’s first season in the chair. Playback and folk singer Rahul Sipligunj beat Sreemukhi to the title and a full ₹50 lakh, with nothing taken out of it.

Season 2 (2018): Kaushal Manda

Nani hosted this one, and only this one. Kaushal Manda took the trophy and ₹50 lakh, with singer Geetha Madhuri as runner-up.

Season 1 (2017): Siva Balaji

The season that started all of it, with Jr NTR hosting. Actor Siva Balaji won ahead of Aadarsh Balakrishna and took ₹50 lakh, back when the winner simply got the whole advertised prize.

Bigg Boss Telugu hosts by season

Three hosts in nine seasons, and one of them has done nearly all of it. Jr NTR took the first, Nani the second, and Nagarjuna Akkineni has had the chair for the seven seasons since, Season 3 through Season 9. He’s back for an eighth: Season 10’s promo has him fronting it. If that’s what brought you here, the Season 10 premiere page covers the channel, the streaming platform and what’s known so far about the next run.

How many Bigg Boss Telugu seasons are there?

Nine, running from 2017 to 2025. You’ll still find pages promising “Bigg Boss winners from 1 to 16”. Those are counting the Hindi edition, which has run for many more seasons than the Telugu one. Season numbers don’t line up between editions, so if you spot Hindi names in a Telugu table, that’s a fair sign nobody checked the list.

Is there a Season 10 winner yet?

Not yet. JioStar has said six Bigg Boss editions across India roll out from September 2026, Nagarjuna is back as host and it runs on Star Maa again. The Telugu premiere date, the cast and the voting rules are all still unannounced, so you won’t find a date here. When the season does run, the winner comes out of the audience vote through the finale, and you can read how that works in the how to vote guide. The current Season 10 cast tracker follows names as they get confirmed.