Prayaag Akbar is the author of a critically-acclaimed work of fiction, Leila. His novel, published early in 2017, won the Crossword Jury Prize and the Tata Lit Live! First Book Award and was shortlisted for the Hindu Prize for Best Fiction and the Shakti Bhatt Award. It was developed into a series by Netflix, directed by Deepa Mehta. In July 2018, a new edition was released in the United Kingdom and a number of other territories.

Prayaag Akbar has worked as a journalist in a number of leading Indian publications. He was a consulting editor with Mint, a leading Indian financial newspaper, and before that was the deputy editor of the news website Scroll, where he was an early member of the team.