India’s biggest mutual funds: 5 hybrid schemes feature in the top 10. Here’s how their SIP returns compare

Mutual fund investors are not putting their largest pools of money only into equity funds. The latest ranking of India’s biggest equity and hybrid schemes shows a more diversified pattern: five of the 10 largest funds are hybrid schemes, with investors holding large sums in balanced advantage, aggressive hybrid, multi-asset and arbitrage funds.

The five hybrid funds together manage around ₹4.35 lakh crore, underscoring how much investor money has flowed into strategies that combine equity with debt or other asset classes. At the same time, the list includes some of India’s biggest flexi-cap, mid-cap and small-cap funds. Their return records are just as varied, with three-, five- and 10-year SIP returns showing that the size of a fund and the returns it delivers are two very different measures.

Which funds have attracted the most money?

Parag Parikh Flexi Cap Fund is the largest scheme in the list, with ₹1.47 lakh crore in AUM as of 31 August 2026. HDFC Flexi Cap Fund and HDFC Mid Cap Fund follow, with ₹1.14 lakh crore and ₹1.08 lakh crore, respectively.

But hybrid funds feature prominently from the fourth position onwards. HDFC Balanced Advantage Fund has ₹1.07 lakh crore, while SBI Aggressive Hybrid Fund and ICICI Prudential Multi Asset Allocation Fund have ₹88,668 crore and ₹87,833 crore, respectively.

Nippon India Small Cap Fund, with ₹82,580 crore, is the largest small-cap scheme in the list. ICICI Prudential Large Cap Fund has ₹80,206 crore, while Kotak Arbitrage Fund and ICICI Prudential Balanced Advantage Fund have ₹75,712 crore and ₹75,399 crore, respectively.

How did the biggest funds perform?

The AUM ranking looks very different from a return ranking. Among the 10 schemes, Nippon India Small Cap Fund had the highest three-year SIP return at 10.45%, while its five-year and 10-year SIP returns were 17.41% and 22.12%, respectively.

HDFC Mid Cap was another strong long-term performer, with SIP returns of 9.52% over three years, 17.47% over five years and 19.24% over 10 years.

Among the hybrid funds, ICICI Prudential Multi Asset Allocation Fund had the highest SIP returns across the three periods among the five: 8.61% over three years, 13.54% over five years and 16.14% over 10 years.

HDFC Balanced Advantage Fund, despite having the fourth-largest AUM in the overall list, delivered 3.86% over three years, 11.07% over five years and 14.35% over 10 years. SBI Aggressive Hybrid Fund returned 7.61%, 10.26% and 12.23% over the same periods.

Kotak Arbitrage Fund’s returns were lower over the longer period, at 7.27% over five years and 6.63% over 10 years, reflecting the very different nature of an arbitrage strategy compared with equity-oriented hybrid funds.

For investors, the more useful exercise is therefore to look beyond the size of a fund and understand what it invests in, how its strategy differs from other funds and whether that strategy fits the investor’s own time horizon and risk appetite.