India and the United States Did About US$239.6 Billion of Goods and Services Trade in 2025, and the Partnership Now Includes 113 Fighter Engines, a Joint Radar Satellite and a Ten-Year Defence Framework

The US Trade Representative puts goods and services trade between the United States and India at about US$239.6 billion for 2025, up 12.1 per cent on 2024. India’s own customs data show the United States as the largest buyer of Indian goods in 2025-26, at US$87.3 billion, or 19.8 per cent of India’s goods exports.

Both governments use the word partnership, as in the Framework for the US-India Major Defence Partnership signed on 31 October 2025. This article sets out, as of 19 October 2026, what each side buys, builds and shares, with the figure, the date and the official page behind each.

What the trade figures say

The US numbers cover calendar 2025. Goods trade was about US$149.1 billion, made up of US$45.4 billion of US exports to India (up 9.1 per cent) and US$103.8 billion of US imports from India (up 18.9 per cent). Services trade was about US$90.4 billion on the Trade Representative’s estimate, with US$42.9 billion of US exports and US$47.6 billion of US imports, so the flow in services runs close to even.

India counts on an April to March year, so its totals differ from the US ones. In 2025-26 India sold the United States US$87.3 billion of goods, up 0.9 per cent, and bought US$53.5 billion from it, up 17.2 per cent, according to the Department of Commerce’s July 2026 quick estimate. The United States ranked first among India’s export destinations, ahead of the United Arab Emirates at US$37.4 billion.

The newest Indian figures cover April to September 2026. All India Radio reported on 16 October 2026 that goods exports to the United States rose to around US$51 billion, against US$45.73 billion a year earlier, with electronic goods, petroleum products, engineering goods, chemicals and farm products supporting the rise. India’s wider export record is set out in tuput’s piece on India’s US$863.1 billion of exports in 2025-26.

Defence: a ten-year framework, engines and joint exercises

On 31 October 2025 India’s Defence Minister and the US Secretary of War signed a ten-year framework in Kuala Lumpur, on the margins of the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting-Plus. India’s Ministry of Defence says the document is meant to give “a unified vision and policy direction” for deeper defence cooperation. The ministry adds that the Secretary of War told his Indian counterpart that India is a priority country for US defence cooperation.

The agenda had been set earlier. The leaders’ joint statement of 13 February 2025 counted C-130J and C-17 transport aircraft, P-8I patrol aircraft, Chinook and Apache helicopters, MH-60R Seahawks, M777 howitzers and MQ-9B drones among the US-origin equipment already in Indian service. It then promised the new framework and more US defence sales and co-production, naming Javelin missiles and Stryker infantry combat vehicles, and welcomed industry tie-ups, among them Anduril with Mahindra and L3Harris with Bharat Electronics.

The Defence Ministry’s 2025 year-end review records the contracts that followed. On 25 September 2025 the ministry signed with Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) for 97 Tejas Mk1A fighters at over Rs 62,370 crore, with indigenous content above 64 per cent. On 7 November 2025 HAL signed an agreement with General Electric of the United States for 113 F404-GE-IN20 engines and a support package for those aircraft, with deliveries from 2027 to 2032.

A larger step is in negotiation. GE Aerospace and HAL said on 14 April 2026 that they had reached agreement on technical matters for co-producing the F414 engine, which is meant for the Tejas Mk2, according to an ANI report carried by The Tribune. That report mentions no commercial contract. How India built its fighter, carrier and missile programmes is covered in India’s defence industry from importer to maker.

Purchases of American platforms continue alongside. The ministry’s 2024 year-end review says it contracted with the US Government in October 2024 for 31 MQ-9B Sky Guardian and Sea Guardian long-endurance drones for the three services. A second contract, with General Atomics Global India, covers maintenance, repair and overhaul of those drones in India.

The two militaries also train together. The 2025 review lists the tri-service Tiger Triumph exercise at Visakhapatnam in April 2025, the first edition with cyber representatives from both countries. It lists Tiger Claw 25, run from 26 May to 9 June 2025 and described as the first independent special forces exercise between the two air forces, with 113 jumps from Indian and US C-130J aircraft. An Indian Army contingent took part in Yudh Abhyas in the United States in September 2025.

Technology: TRUST, AI and Pax Silica

The February 2025 leaders’ statement launched TRUST, an initiative covering artificial intelligence, semiconductors, quantum technology, biotechnology, energy and space, with safeguards for sensitive technology. It promised an AI infrastructure roadmap by the end of 2025 and supply-chain work on semiconductors, critical minerals and pharmaceuticals.

On 20 February 2026 the two countries signed the Pax Silica Declaration, a grouping of countries that commit to economic security and to building secure, trusted AI ecosystems. The US Ambassador to India, the Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs and the secretary of India’s electronics and IT ministry signed it, and the State Department welcomed India as the tenth signatory. The department’s list of what India brings is a deep talent pool, critical-mineral processing and refining capacity, and investment in AI infrastructure.

The trade framework of 6 February 2026 adds a commercial strand, saying the two countries “will significantly increase trade in technology products”, including graphics processors and other data-centre goods. The semiconductor part of the agenda sits beside India’s own plant programme, mapped in the semiconductor fab race.

Space: NISAR and an Indian astronaut on the station

NISAR is the first joint satellite mission of NASA and ISRO. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory built its L-band radar, which works at a wavelength of about 25 centimetres and can see through cloud. The satellite images the same ground twice every 12 days.

NASA began releasing L-band data to the public on 20 July 2026, starting with observations made on or after 17 June 2026. The files are free to download, and NASA expects the complete science record by the end of 2026. What the satellite has mapped so far is in tuput’s NISAR explainer.

The human side of the programme flew in 2025. ISRO’s astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla launched on the Axiom-4 mission on 25 June 2025 aboard a SpaceX Dragon, with NASA, Axiom Space and the European Space Agency among the partners. ISRO says the mission lasted 18 days and covered about 12 million kilometres in about 282 orbits. Shukla completed seven microgravity experiments developed by Indian research institutions, covering muscle regeneration, algal growth and crop viability among other subjects, and the samples came back for analysis. The Dragon splashed down off California on 15 July 2025. India’s own crewed programme is described in the Gaganyaan piece.

People: students, engineers and founders

The Pew Research Center, using 2023 Census Bureau data, counts 5.2 million people who identified as Indian alone or in combination. Their median household income was US$151,200, against US$105,600 for Asian-headed households overall. Pew reports that 77 per cent of Indian Americans aged 25 and over hold a bachelor’s or higher degree, compared with 56 per cent of Asian Americans overall, and that 66 per cent of the Indian population are immigrants.

India is the largest sender of international students to US colleges. The Institute of International Education counted 363,019 Indian students in 2024/25, up 10 per cent, ahead of China’s 265,919. It adds that all international students together contributed nearly US$55 billion to the US economy in 2024, a figure from the US Department of Commerce that is not broken down by country.

Indian-born workers hold most H-1B visas, the US work permit for specialist jobs. In its report dated 24 April 2026, US Citizenship and Immigration Services says 406,348 H-1B beneficiaries were approved in fiscal year 2025, which ran from 1 October 2024 to 30 September 2025. Of those, 283,772, or 69.9 per cent, were born in India, and China came second at 12.1 per cent. Computer-related jobs made up 62 per cent of approvals. The median annual pay was US$133,000, which the report defines as what the employer agreed to pay when it filed the petition.

On company founding, the National Foundation for American Policy, an Arlington, Virginia research group, published an analysis on 3 June 2026. It counted 775 privately held US companies valued at US$1 billion or more as of April 2026, of which immigrants founded or co-founded 455. India, with 96 companies, is the largest country of origin among those founders, ahead of Israel with 60.

The Quad: four pillars and an India-hosted centre

The foreign ministers of Australia, India and Japan and the US Secretary of State met in New Delhi on 26 May 2026. Their joint statement organises Quad work under four pillars: maritime and transnational security, economic prosperity and security, critical and emerging technologies, and humanitarian assistance and emergency response.

Several items are tied to India. The statement welcomes India’s operationalisation of the Indian Ocean Region programme of the Quad’s maritime domain awareness partnership through the Information Fusion Centre in Gurugram, and says India will host the next Quad-at-Sea Ship Observer Mission after the first one, from Palau to Guam in July 2025. The ministers announced a Quad Critical Minerals Framework and a Quad Initiative on Indo-Pacific Energy Security, and said the four countries will work with Fiji on port infrastructure.

The February 2025 leaders’ statement said the Prime Minister looked forward to hosting the US President in New Delhi for the leaders’ summit. The May 2026 statement says only that the ministers look forward to the summit’s convening, and gives no date.

Where the tariffs and trade talks stand on 19 October 2026

The joint statement of 6 February 2026 set out a framework for an interim trade agreement. It named an 18 per cent US tariff rate on Indian goods and said the United States would remove that tariff on generic medicines, gems and diamonds, and aircraft parts once the agreement is concluded. India would cut or end tariffs on all US industrial goods and on a range of food and farm products, and it stated an intention to buy US$500 billion of US energy products, aircraft and parts, precious metals, technology products and coking coal over five years.

Separately, on 23 July 2026 the Trade Representative took final action under Section 301 of the US Trade Act against 60 economies over forced-labour import bans, and placed India in its 10 per cent tier alongside 16 other economies. The tiers run from 10 to 12.5 per cent.

All India Radio reported on 16 October 2026 that India’s Commerce Secretary described the talks on the trade agreement as moving in the right direction, and that both countries are working to conclude it at the earliest. The February framework also states that either country may modify its commitments if the other changes its agreed tariffs.