Amazon India is preparing a major expansion of its quick commerce business, with a reported plan to invest $3 billion, or about Rs 28,790 crore, in Amazon Now over the next four years, according to sources cited by Reuters. The proposed capital infusion underscores how seriously the ecommerce giant is treating the rapid-delivery segment, even though it entered the market later than several of its competitors.
Under the reported plan, Amazon would deploy $1 billion into the vertical by the end of 2027 and another $2 billion by 2030. The fresh capital is expected to fund a broad build-out of the business, including new dark stores, stronger inventory management software, AI tools for demand prediction and a wider product assortment. One source told Reuters that the company's focus will be on stocking daily essentials rather than premium electronics such as iPhones, a signal that Amazon intends to compete more directly on frequency, convenience and basket size rather than high-ticket items.
The scale of the expansion is significant. Another source reportedly said Amazon is aiming to grow its dark store network to around 1,300 outlets by April 2027, up from about 750 currently. Dark stores, which are small, local fulfilment hubs designed for rapid order picking and dispatch, are the backbone of the quick commerce model. Their density and efficiency often determine how quickly a platform can promise delivery within minutes, making them central to the economics of the sector.
Amazon Now first launched in Bengaluru in June 2025 before expanding to parts of Delhi in July and later to Mumbai. While the service entered the market later than rivals, it has begun to gain momentum as Amazon leans on its logistics expertise and deep capital base to close the gap. In April, Amazon India vice president of operations Abhinav Singh said in a blog post that the company would invest Rs 2,800 crore, or around $300 million, to expand its quick commerce vertical and strengthen its logistics network. The newly reported plan suggests that the company's ambitions are now much larger than that earlier commitment.
The investment also fits into Amazon's broader India strategy. Last year, the company announced a Rs 2,000 crore investment to add 17 new fulfilment centres, six sortation centres and 75 last-mile delivery stations across the country. Before that, Amazon had committed to invest $35 billion across its India businesses by 2030, with the stated goal of boosting cumulative exports from India to $80 billion by the same year. The latest quick commerce push indicates that Amazon sees instant delivery not as a side experiment, but as a core part of its long-term India playbook.
The timing is no coincidence. India's quick commerce market has become one of the most fiercely contested arenas in technology and retail, drawing in both incumbents and new entrants with deep pockets. Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart and Zepto remain the dominant players, but competition has intensified as Walmart-backed Flipkart Minutes and Reliance's JioMart push aggressively into the space. These newer entrants are spending heavily to expand dark store networks and improve delivery speed, hoping to win share in a market where consumer expectations are rising quickly.
Flipkart Minutes has already scaled to 1,000 dark stores across 130 cities, and brokerage UBS estimates it could add another 1,000 by mid-2027 ahead of the Big Billion Days sale that year. Blinkit remains the category leader with more than 2,600 dark stores across 300 cities, while Zepto and Instamart each operate over 1,100 fulfilment centres. The numbers highlight just how capital-intensive the race has become, with scale, logistics and inventory precision now as important as brand recognition.
At stake is a market that homegrown research firm Inc42 projects could become a $40 billion opportunity by 2030. For Amazon, the reported $3 billion commitment is a clear attempt to secure a meaningful position in that future. The company's challenge will be to translate capital into operational speed, dense coverage and reliable assortment in a segment where customers expect near-immediate delivery and competitors are already deeply embedded. If the plan proceeds as reported, Amazon's next phase in India may be defined less by ecommerce breadth and more by the race to deliver milk, snacks, groceries and daily essentials faster than anyone else.