During his visit to India this week, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy spelled out the company’s quick-commerce business Amazon Now’s ambition to reach 300 cities across the country, a move that is expected to give it the widest footprint in the category. Amazon Now is the firm’s fastest-growing e-commerce business, with orders doubling every quarter since its launch in September last year. Jassy also announced that the company will invest $48 billion in the country by 2030, across all its businesses.
Experts say Amazon has a realistic shot at taking on the top quick commerce brands, despite its late entry. To create greater value, Amazon Now will need to go beyond speed and discounts. “Every player will need to win on brand preference, not price. Amazon has already cracked part of this with Prime. The next battleground is experience where consistency and safety, especially with consumables, are what actually earn loyalty over time,”says Siddharth Devnani, co-founder & COO, SoCheers.
The brand’s Prime loyal membership base employs a model that has repeatedly proven itself, says Devnani. Amazon also brings far stronger operational structure, he says, with the highest standards in the business, which also gives it an edge. Experts say every brand in the space will need to define their own version of a ‘trust signal’. Amazon has gone on the offensive against the term ‘dark store’, pushing narratives around operator wellbeing and site cleanliness instead.
Assortment will also play a major role in its push, since quick-commerce has moved well beyond grocery staples into categories like gifting, fashion and pet care. “Platforms that understand occasions better will win more moments. For example, a last-minute birthday gift, a puja requirement, a beauty refill or a forgotten charger. That is where quick commerce becomes truly powerful,” observes Vishal Prabhu, creative director, strategy at White Rivers Media. If consumers trust the platform to solve small but urgent needs reliably, he adds that it becomes a habit.
The opportunity is immense. As per estimates, the quick-commerce market was over `28,000 crore in FY24 and is expected to cross Rs 1 lakh crore by FY28. Amazon Now serves over 50 million customers across 15 major cities currently. Its expansion means that the platform will now go deeper into tier-II and III markets, where major competitors Zepto, Blinkit and Swiggy Instamart have a limited presence. Blinkit, which is the market leader, is reportedly present in about 200 cities already, while Instamart and Zepto are present across 129 and 66 cities respectively.
Differentiation strategy
Large e-commerce players like Amazon bring infrastructure muscle and deep pockets, but quick-commerce is fundamentally a last-mile trust game where homegrown players like Zepto and Blinkit have a structural advantage, opines Akash Agrawalla, co-founder of the spice brand, ZOFF Foods. “Over the next 12 months, we can expect Blinkit to consolidate its urban stronghold while Zepto doubles down on tier-II penetration since that’s where the next 100 million users are.”
These brands have built their dark store density by being ruthlessly local. MNCs will compete on selection depth and brand partnerships, but converting that into speed and reliability at scale is a different challenge, says Agrawalla, noting that the winners will be the brand that cracks the unit economics outside of the top eight metros.
Amazon Now’s daily order volumes are around 500,000, much lower than other quick-commerce firms, as per industry estimates. Blinkit in comparison processed roughly 3 million daily orders in the March 2026 quarter.
Besides its Prime membership, industry watchers say that retail media will be a key profitability lever for Amazon, where the real money lies. The quick-commerce model funds its cash burn through advertising, and Amazon understands advertising better than most others.
These platforms sit close to the point of purchase, which makes them very attractive to brands. “If Amazon Now can connect quick-commerce behaviour with sponsored search, category takeovers, sampling, product discovery, brand stores and measurable purchase outcomes, it can build a very strong ad revenue layer,” points out Prabhu, adding that quick commerce platforms can only be sustainable by becoming sharper retail platforms.
In FY25, advertising accounted for 28% of Amazon India’s revenue at `8,342 crore, surging by 110% over FY21. Devnani adds that Amazon, like other big tech players such as Google and Meta, has democratised advertising, giving brands with very small budgets a seat at the table. In comparison, Indian platforms across social, e-commerce, and quick-commerce are still well behind on this.