Work-life balance: How Indians relax, socialize and pray, in charts

Mint

09-07-2025

In a rapidly changing world, free time is often a luxury. And while India debates work-life balance, a Mint analysis of the 2024 Time Use Survey—a national government study of over 450,000 people—reveals leisure and socializing are vital for Indians, making up about a fifth of their day. However, significant differences emerge across communities, gender, and age. Mint unpacks the data:
Leisure gap
As women carry a heavier workload, both paid and unpaid work, they naturally have less time for leisure activities and socializing. Women, on average, spend 274 minutes (about 4.57 hours) a day on activities such as mass media usage, communication, community participation, religious practice, culture, and sports practices.
Men spend 293 minutes (about 4.88 hours). It is interesting to note that the overall Indian figure is heavily influenced by rural women; urban women enjoy slightly more leisure time than others.
When it comes to paid and unpaid work combined (men do more paid work and women do more unpaid work), rural women work the most, 6.40 hours on average, followed by urban men, about 6.02 hours. This leaves rural women with about 4.40 hours for leisurely activities as opposed to 4.88 hours for rural men and 4.97 hours for urban women.
The difference between urban men and women is not too stark, but nevertheless exists, with women enjoying slightly more free time than men.
Urban TV dominance
A deeper look at the data shows that watching TV, conversing and reflecting, and resting and relaxing are among the top three leisure activities of Indians across groups. However, despite being common, they are prioritized differently in rural and urban areas.
Watching TV emerges strongly, with the longest time spent by urban women (101 minutes), followed by urban men (90 minutes). Watching TV is also more common among richer groups (102 minutes spent by the top 20%) as opposed to poorer groups (62 minutes by the bottom 20%).
Conversely, urban Indians spend less time reflecting, resting and relaxing. Urban men particularly stand out as they spend the least time at 31 minutes compared to 43 minutes by urban women, 44 minutes by rural men and 50 minutes by rural women.
Since women in rural areas work the hardest, they unwind more by conversing (talking or chatting) than watching TV. Overall, time spent conversing is more or less the same in rural and urban areas, but it is preferred over watching television in rural areas.
Also Read: Marriage changes women's lives—men's, not so much. The data shows it.
Bypassing books
While Indians spend a significant amount of their time watching TV, the habit of reading for leisure is conspicuously missing from their day. On average, Indians spend only up to five minutes on this, which can be explained by the extremely low participation rate.
Leisure reading sees about 0.8-1.5% participation rate among Indians aged six to 14 years. This participation rate rises with age, though it remains 1.0-9.9% for those aged 15-59 years. It is more common among the elderly (60 years and above), with urban men standing out with a 31.4% participation rate.
In comparison, the participation rate among urban women is quite less at 8.2%. This gap in reading can be partly explained by the heavy burden of work that women carry (246 minutes) compared to men (222 minutes) in urban areas, even into old age. While leisure reading is rare, those who do participate in the activity spend roughly 40-70 minutes on it.
Also Read: UPI fuels rural women's digital leap—but few own their phones
Religious rein
Prayers and other religious activities are an important part of India's fabric, but it is significantly more prominent among older urban women than any other cohort.
In general, women spend more time than men on religious practices (which are dominated by private prayer, meditation and other spiritual activities). More particularly, urban women spend more time than men, as well as rural women.
The activity becomes more prominent as Indians get older—a trend common in both rural and urban areas. About 50% of older women and 30% of older men participate in these activities. In rural areas, men aged 60 years and older spend 11 minutes more than those aged 15-59 years. Similarly, women spend 13 minutes more. In urban areas, older men spend 16 minutes more and older women 21 minutes more. Overall, older urban women spend the maximum time (41 minutes) as opposed to the 9-30 minutes spent by others.
Formative conditioning
The gender gap between men and women that takes form in various ways begins to take shape from the formative years. Among the Indians aged 6-14 years, boys enjoy more leisure time than girls. This again is a reflection of more work burden on women, from a younger age itself.
Girls, on average, spend 27 minutes on paid and unpaid work as compared to boys, who spend only 11 minutes. As a result, when it comes to leisure and socializing, boys have the freedom to spend more time than girls.
Though there is a visible gap between boys and girls, the divide actually exists in one activity group: playing games and other pastime activities. While boys spend 133 minutes, girls get to spend only 113 minutes. The difference is more in rural areas, with a gap of 21 minutes between boys and girls compared to 17 minutes in urban areas. When it comes to conversing, watching TV, and relaxing, girls are broadly on par with boys.