In Malayalam, Nayanthara was last seen playing the female lead in Dhyan Sreenivasan’s debut directorial, Love Action Drama, that featured Nivin Pauly as the male lead. Nayanthara’s performance and pairing with Nivin Pauly received positive reviews from the critics and general audience. Following that, Nayanthara has now signed her next in Malayalam cinema and in this film, she would be seen sharing screen space with Kunchacko Boban. This new film will be a thriller which is titled Nizhal (Shadow). Award winning editor Appu N Bhattathiri of Veeram and Ottamuri Velicham fame will make his directorial debut with this venture.

Nizhal will be produced by Anto Joseph Film Company and Melange Film House, in association with Tentpole Movies. The film will have music scored by Sooraj S Kurup while the cinematography will be handled by Deepak D Menon. Sanjeev has penned the story of this film. The makers have announced that the film will release in 2021. Nizhal's shooting is all set to begin tomorrow (October 19) in Ernakulam. Talking to Times Of India about this project, Kunchacko Boban was quoted as saying, "I had heard the narration a long time ago and had committed to the film. But it has a strong female character and they were in search of someone to play the role. That’s when I suggested Nayanthara’s name. Nayanthara loved the script. We decided to go ahead with this now, since she gave her go ahead. Most of the movie will be filmed in Ernakulam and with just two days of shoot planned outside Kerala".

In Tamil, Nayanthara's next release would be Mookuthi Amman which marks the directorial debut of RJ Balaji. Mookuthi Amman is touted to have a direct OTT release on Disney + Hotstar platform, but an official announcement is yet to be made. Nayanthara's next as a solo lead will be Netrikann which is a thriller directed by Milind Rau of Aval fame. Nayanthara's partner Vignesh Shivan makes his debut as a producer with Netrikann and he has bankrolled the film under the banner of Rowdy Pictures.

Following that, Nayanthara will be seen playing one of the leads in Vignesh Shivan's directorial, Kaathuvaakula Rendu Kaadhal that will have Vijay Sethupathi and Samantha as the other leads. The lady superstar will also be seen playing a crucial role in Superstar Rajinikanth's Annaatthe directed by Siva and produced by Sun Pictures.