Tiger Zinda Hai is a 2017 Indian Hindi-language action spy thriller film directed by Ali Abbas Zafar and produced by Aditya Chopra under the Yash Raj Films banner. It is the second instalment in the Yash Raj Films Spy Universe and a sequel to Ek Tha Tiger (2012). The film stars Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif, reprising their roles as the Indian RAW agent Avinash Singh "Tiger" Rathore and the Pakistani ISI agent Zoya Humaimi.
The plot is loosely inspired by the 2014 abduction of Indian and other foreign nurses by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Tikrit, Iraq, and their subsequent rescue.
| Title | Tiger Zinda Hai |
|---|---|
| Director | Ali Abbas Zafar |
| Producer | Aditya Chopra |
| Writers | Ali Abbas Zafar (screenplay), Neelesh Misra (story) |
| Studio | Yash Raj Films |
| Lead cast | Salman Khan, Katrina Kaif |
| Music | Vishal–Shekhar (songs), Julius Packiam (score) |
| Cinematography | Marcin Laskawiec |
| Editor | Rameshwar S. Bhagat |
| Language | Hindi |
| Release date | 22 December 2017 |
| Franchise | YRF Spy Universe |
| Predecessor | Ek Tha Tiger (2012) |
| Sequel | Tiger 3 (2023) |
Eight years after Tiger and Zoya disappeared at the end of Ek Tha Tiger, the couple is living in hiding with their young son in the snowy mountains of Austria. When a militant group identified as ISC captures twenty-five Indian and Pakistani nurses at a hospital in the fictional Iraqi city of Ikrit, RAW seeks out Tiger to lead a covert rescue mission. Tiger assembles a joint team that eventually includes ISI agents, with Zoya joining him in the field. The film culminates in a hospital siege and a desert convoy operation to extract the hostages.
Principal photography began in March 2017. The film was shot across multiple locations including Austria (the Tyrolean Alps), Abu Dhabi, Morocco, Greece and parts of India. The Abu Dhabi shoot, supported by the local film commission, recreated the fictional Iraqi setting and a major hospital sequence. The action sequences were choreographed by Tom Struthers, known for his work on Christopher Nolan's films.
The soundtrack was composed by Vishal–Shekhar with lyrics primarily by Irshad Kamil. The album was released by YRF Music. Notable tracks include "Swag Se Swagat," "Dil Diyan Gallan," "Tera Noor" and the title song "Zinda." "Swag Se Swagat," sung by Vishal Dadlani and Neha Bhasin, became one of the most-viewed Indian songs on YouTube in the period after release.
Tiger Zinda Hai released worldwide on 22 December 2017, coinciding with the Christmas holiday period. The film received generally positive reviews from critics, who praised its action sequences, scale and the performances of the lead pair, while some commentary noted a conventional spy-thriller template.
Commercially, the film was a major success and ranks among the highest-grossing Hindi films of 2017. It crossed the ₹300 crore mark in domestic collections and performed strongly in overseas markets, particularly in the Gulf region.
The film cemented the YRF Spy Universe as a continuing franchise built around interconnected espionage stories. It marked the first sequel within the universe and laid the groundwork for crossovers with later films such as War (2019), Pathaan (2023) and Tiger 3 (2023). Its commercial performance reinforced the viability of large-scale, action-driven Hindi tentpole films released around the festive year-end window.