Amazon ramps up ‘dark store’ network for quick commerce in India

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Amazon India is aggressively scaling its network of dark stores to accelerate deliveries and stay competitive in the surging quick commerce market, according to a report by Business Standard. These stores — localised fulfilment hubs not open to the public — are critical to reducing delivery times for everyday essentials.

Sources indicate that Amazon has added over 10 new dark stores in cities like Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Delhi-NCR in the last quarter alone. The company is also onboarding local partners through a flexible franchise model, enabling faster regional expansion without heavy capital investment.

The move aligns with Amazon’s broader India strategy for 2025, where speed, convenience, and coverage are becoming major differentiators. With Flipkart’s Supermart and Zepto, Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, and Reliance-backed JioMart all jostling for urban basket share, Amazon is trying to close the time gap from one-day to under-2-hour delivery in key zones.

Interestingly, Amazon is not overtly branding these operations as ‘quick commerce’ to avoid diluting its core e-commerce identity. Instead, it is bundling services under the Prime umbrella and using tech-backed demand prediction and regional SKU clustering to optimise fulfilment.

This stealth expansion also includes a push for hyperlocal hiring, with a focus on part-time delivery partners and dynamic shift scheduling, potentially boosting employment while cutting operational costs.

With India’s quick commerce market projected to touch $5.5 billion by 2025, Amazon’s dark store play could help it tap into new consumer segments, particularly the daily-use and impulse-buying cohort, without having to overhaul its platform UI or pricing model.