Quick commerce orders jumped 75% this Diwali, but baskets shrank. Should your brand move budget there?

What happened

Unicommerce, whose Uniware software processes online orders for many Indian brands and sellers, has released its review of the 2026 Diwali season. It looked at more than 138 million order items. It compared 6 October to 4 November 2026 with the matching festive window last year, 17 September to 16 October 2025.

• Total order volumes grew 21%. Orders under ₹1,000 made up 85% of all orders.
• Quick commerce grew fastest: orders up 75%, but gross merchandise value (GMV, the total value of the orders) up only 38%.
• Brands' own websites: orders up 30%, GMV up 26%.
• Marketplaces still had the largest share of orders, but grew slowly: orders up 8%, GMV up 6%.
• Tier-3 cities gave the biggest share of orders, 41%, and grew 26%. Tier-1 cities and metros gave 34% and grew 13%. Prepaid payments were 61% of orders.

The headline everyone will repeat is “quick commerce up 75%”. For a marketer, the gap between 75% and 38% matters more.

The case

1Clarify

• What are our own order values and margins on each channel? Unicommerce's figures are averages across many sellers, so ours could look quite different.
• What does one quick-commerce order cost us? Commission, ads on the app and any fixed fees decide whether a small order makes money.
• What is the goal next quarter: profit, or new customers? The answer changes how much a loss-making first order is worth.
• Are quick-commerce buyers new to us? If they are our website customers switching apps, we gain little and pay a commission we didn't pay before.

2Structure

1. Customers: who buys on each channel, and are they new or existing customers?
2. Unit economics: what one order earns us on each channel after all costs.
3. Measurement: can we compare channels fairly on profit and repeat buying?
4. Long-term control: customer data, pricing and how we appear on each channel.

3Analyse

Work out what happened to the basket

If you know how much orders grew and how much their value grew, you can work out the change in average order value (AOV): (1 + GMV growth) ÷ (1 + order growth) − 1.

On quick-commerce apps, the average order got about a fifth smaller. On brand websites and marketplaces it barely moved. Part of this could be mix: more small-city shoppers and more low-price categories joining the apps. Either way, the typical quick-commerce order is now a small one.

Why a smaller basket hurts

Some costs are the same for every order, whatever its size: the ad that won the click, packing, fixed fees. Here is a simple example, with assumptions clearly marked:

• Last year our quick-commerce AOV was ₹600 (assumption).
• We keep 50% of order value after product cost and the platform's commission (assumption).
• Each order carries ₹150 of fixed cost (assumption).

Last year each order earned 600 × 50% − 150 = ₹150. Now suppose our basket shrinks in line with the channel, to 600 × 0.79 ≈ ₹473. Each order now earns 473 × 50% − 150 ≈ ₹87, about 42% less.

Then add the growth. For every 100 orders last year we earned ₹15,000. If we also grew orders by 75%, that is 175 orders × ₹87 ≈ ₹15,150. Seventy-five per cent more orders, and only about 1% more profit.

What the other channels say

Brand websites grew orders 30% with almost no fall in basket size, and they give us the customer's details for repeat marketing. Marketplaces are big but grew slowly. So the data does not say “leave marketplaces”. It says quick commerce wins on reach and speed, and we must make each order there worth more before we pay to scale it. Our worked marketing case shows how to compare channels on the cost of a repeat customer.

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