Launched on April 6, 1985, with just 2,000 servings, the programme currently caters to nearly three lakh devotees on weekends and peak days while serving around 1.9 lakh devotees on regular days, an official press release from TTD said on Wednesday.

"Regarded as a modern-day Akshaya Patra, TTD's Nitya Annaprasadam programme provides free and nutritious meals, breakfast and beverages to nearly three lakh devotees every day during weekends and peak seasons," said the press release.

Nitya Annaprasadam has emerged as a globally recognised model of humanitarian and spiritual service, ensuring every devotee visiting Tirumala receives a nutritious and satisfying meal free of cost, it said.

On an average day, nearly 70,000 devotees are served beverages such as milk, tea and coffee; around 60,200 devotees receive breakfast; 99,500 devotees receive lunch, and 56,700 receive dinner, taking the total daily servings to nearly three lakh.

More than 82,000 devotees are served daily at the Matrusri Tarigonda Vengamamba Annaprasadam Complex, where four dining halls can accommodate nearly 4,000 devotees at a time, it said.

According to the temple body, TTD consumes about 9,600 litres of milk every day for preparing milk-based beverages and refreshments distributed under the programme. To prepare the meals, TTD uses around 15.8 tonnes of rice, 3.1 tonnes of sunflower oil and 2.8 tonnes of red gram dal every day, besides significant quantities of wheat rava, suji rava, black gram dal, jaggery, salt, tamarind and other ingredients, the release said.

Additionally, the temple body consumes around 4,375 coconuts daily along with sugar, dried red chillies, coriander seeds and several other ingredients used in preparing meals and refreshments.

According to TTD statistics, more than 44 million servings of meals, breakfast and beverages were made through various Annaprasadam centres in Tirumala between January and May, 2026.

There were around 10 million servings in January, 7.1 million in February, 8.48 million in March, 8.5 million in April and more than 9.2 million servings in May, the release said.

TTD has introduced several modernisation initiatives, including the commissioning of the Vakulamata Centralised Kitchen in 2024, which enabled Annaprasadam distribution to be expanded to 28 additional locations, while a new dining hall at PAC-5 (Venkatadri Nilayam) with a seating capacity of about 1,500 has also become operational.

Further, TTD is planning a new satellite automated kitchen capable of preparing food for two lakh devotees per day and has installed modern cooking equipment in the MTVAC Kitchen, besides introducing QR code-based donation kiosks.