Coinbase reopens in India with crypto trading now and fiat rails in 2026

Coinbase has reopened registrations in India after a pause of more than two years. Indian users can trade between cryptocurrencies in the app today, and the company targets a rupee on-ramp in 2026 after registering with the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU).

John O’Loghlen, Coinbase’s APAC director, outlined the rollout at India Blockchain Week. The exchange began early-access onboarding in October and has now opened the app to users across the country. The planned 2026 on-ramp would allow deposits in Indian rupees to fund purchases and withdrawals, pending implementation.

The exchange launched services in India in 2022 but halted support for the Unified Payments Interface after the National Payments Corporation of India did not acknowledge the exchange on the network. In 2023, Coinbase ended services for local users and asked them to close or transfer accounts.

India taxes crypto income at 30% with no loss offsets and applies a 1% tax deducted at source on each transaction. O’Loghlen expressed hope that policymakers will reduce the burden on people who hold digital assets.

“We had millions of customers in India, historically, and we took a very clear stance to off-board those customers entirely from overseas entities, where they were domiciled and regulated,” O’Loghlen recounted. “Because we wanted to kind of burn the boats, have a clean slate here. As a commercial business person wanting to make money and active users, that’s like the worst thing you can do.”

The company is rebuilding its presence. Coinbase Ventures recently invested more capital in local exchange CoinDCX at a $2.45 billion post-money valuation. Coinbase also plans to add to its more than 500-person team in India to support domestic and global products.

As we covered previously, Coinbase’s 2025 Transparency Report shows a 5.73% year-on-year rise in government and law enforcement requests for user data, with over 53% now coming from outside the U.S. Requests spanned more than 60 countries, concentrated in the U.S., Germany, the UK, France, Spain and Australia. France rose about 111%, the UK 16%, Spain 27%, while Germany fell 5%, Sweden 31% and South Korea 67%. Coinbase says most contacts relate to criminal investigations and that it reviews each request and provides no direct government access.