Amazon Never Acquired Instamart: It Built a Rival Instead
Amazon's bid to buy into Swiggy's Instamart never happened. Here's what happened instead, and how Amazon Now's real scale compares to Blinkit, Instamart and Zepto in 2026.
In July 2024, word broke that Amazon India had approached Swiggy about buying into Instamart, its quick commerce arm, just as Swiggy quietly filed IPO papers with Sebi. The deal went nowhere. Amazon walked away, and instead of buying a rival, it built one: Amazon Now, rolled out through 2025, now moves an estimated 4.5 to 5 lakh orders a day across five major cities. That's the real answer to a question a lot of people are still typing into Google. Amazon doesn't own Instamart. The two are now direct rivals, fighting over the same roughly ₹11,000 crore a month in Indian quick-commerce spending.
Why the Amazon-Instamart Deal Fell Apart
The talks were real. One person close to the discussions described Amazon as having interest in either acquiring "a stake in the ongoing pre-IPO placement or a buyout proposal for Instamart," but said there were "multiple roadblocks" from the start. Two things killed it. Instamart came bundled inside Swiggy's wider food delivery business, a category Amazon has shown little appetite for anywhere in the world. And absorbing all of Swiggy, not just Instamart, would have cost Amazon a reported $10-12 billion: Amazon rarely takes a minority stake in someone else's business, and Instamart alone was never given its own standalone price tag in the talks.
So Amazon didn't buy in. It built its own quick commerce operation from the ground up instead.
What Swiggy Did With Instamart Instead
Swiggy's own move had nothing to do with Amazon. In September 2025, Swiggy's board approved a slump sale of Instamart into a new, wholly owned step-down subsidiary called Swiggy Instamart Private Limited. Shareholders then ratified it with 99.9951% of votes cast in favour (1,153,541,235 for, just 56,888 against), in a postal ballot that ran from 3 October to 1 November 2025. It's a compliance and restructuring move, not a sale to an outside buyer.
Amazon Now's Real Scale in 2026
Amazon didn't need Instamart to get into the business. It started as a four-store pilot in Whitefield, Bengaluru in early 2025. By 2026 it had spread to Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, Chennai and Pune, and reported dark store counts vary by source and month, from just over 500 to a bit over 1,000. What's consistent across sources is the order volume: roughly 4.5 to 5 lakh orders a day. On Amazon's Q1 2026 earnings call, CEO Andy Jassy said Indian orders were growing 25% month-over-month, and that Prime members triple their order frequency once they try the service.
Blinkit is still doing roughly six times that volume: about 30 lakh orders a day across more than 2,200 dark stores.
Amazon Now went from a four-store pilot in one Bengaluru suburb to an estimated 4.5-5 lakh orders a day in about two years, without ever buying the rival it originally wanted to acquire. Blinkit alone still does roughly six times that volume.
Who Actually Leads India's Quick Commerce Market
India's overall quick commerce market was moving about 7.8 million orders a day and roughly ₹11,000 crore a month in gross merchandise value as of January 2026. Blinkit still leads by a wide margin.
| Player | Est. Market Share |
|---|---|
| Blinkit | ~46-48% |
| Swiggy Instamart | ~23-25% |
| Zepto | ~22% |
| Amazon Now + Flipkart Minutes | remaining single digits combined |
Source: Datum Intelligence estimates, early-to-mid 2026; exact splits vary slightly by source and month.
Zomato's Blinkit was valued at roughly $13 billion by Goldman Sachs, a gap that explains a lot about why Amazon chose to build fresh rather than pay a premium for a distant number two. Flipkart reportedly tried a similar tie-up with Swiggy around the same time and walked away for the same reason: neither side could agree on what Instamart was actually worth.
Blinkit's Head Start Is the Real Obstacle
I think the real fight now isn't Amazon versus Instamart at all, it's Amazon Now versus Blinkit. Blinkit built its quick commerce business years earlier and still runs several times Amazon Now's dark store count and roughly six times its daily orders. Closing that gap looks less like a near-term sprint and more like a multi-year war of attrition, fought store by store in the same handful of metro pincodes where all five players are now stacked on top of each other. My honest read: Amazon's 25% month-over-month order growth is real, but a growth rate off a small base always looks dramatic. The number that will actually decide this is daily order volume two years from now, not this quarter's growth headline.
FAQ
Did Amazon acquire Swiggy's Instamart?
No. Amazon was in talks to buy a stake in or acquire Instamart in 2024, but the deal fell apart over valuation and Amazon's reluctance to enter food delivery. Amazon built its own separate service, Amazon Now, instead.
What is Amazon Now?
Amazon Now is Amazon's standalone quick commerce delivery service in India, unrelated to Instamart, moving an estimated 4.5 to 5 lakh orders a day as of 2026.
Who leads India's quick commerce market in 2026?
Blinkit leads by a wide margin, doing roughly 30 lakh orders a day, well ahead of Swiggy Instamart, Zepto, and Amazon Now.
