Flipkart says order surges 40 pc YoY post-festival; user base expands

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E-commerce firm Flipkart on Wednesday said it has reported one of its strongest growth phases in recent years, marked by a sharp rise in customer base, higher order volumes, and deeper participation from Tier-2 and Tier-3 towns.

The company said it served over 200 million customers across its ecosystem during the festive season, reflecting its expanding relevance in urban and non-metro India.

Overall orders on the platform grew 21 per cent during the festive period, and around 40 per cent year-on-year post-festive period, signalling broad-based consumer confidence and category momentum, the company said in a statement.

The festive cycle attracted 101 million customers, with two-thirds of them from non-metro areas - a trend Flipkart said reflects the accelerating shift of smaller towns toward online consumption and category diversification.

"The belief that India's consumption story is driven only by metros is outdated. We see multiple Indians shopping on Flipkart: value-conscious families, convenience-driven younger customers, and a rapidly growing segment of aspirational buyers exploring brands and new categories. This shift is structural, not seasonal. Our priority is to serve all of them with access, affordability, and trust as we deepen our role in India's digital retail economy," Flipkart Chief Corporate Affairs Officer, Rajneesh Kumar, said.

Flipkart attributed its momentum to sustained investments in commerce, supply chain, and technology, supported by a seasoned leadership bench guiding its scale-up and long-term vision.

To support this rising tide of customers, the company doubled down on enabling its seller ecosystem, particularly MSMEs.

A major development this year was Flipkart's introduction of a zero-commission model for all eligible products priced below Rs 1,000, which is expected to reduce sellers' platform costs by up to 30 per cent in certain categories.

This strategic move strengthens the platform's inclusive marketplace by allowing sellers to price more competitively, expand selection, and meet the massive demand in the sub-Rs 1,000 segment.

On Shopsy, Flipkart's hyper-value platform, the zero-commission structure applies across all price points.

Flipkart said the change expands affordability for customers, while enabling MSMEs to scale more easily.

Sakait Chaudhary, Senior Vice President and Head of Marketplace, said the initiative is designed to widen opportunities. "Millions of customers in India shop in the sub-Rs 1,000 segment. By removing commission barriers, we allow sellers to price more competitively, expand their catalogue, and reach more households. This is how we strengthen a more inclusive, sustainable marketplace."  The festive period also witnessed a strong momentum from India's MSME ecosystem. Flipkart saw participation from lakhs of sellers, with women-led enterprises, regional manufacturers, and artisan communities showing significant momentum.

The company said this signals accelerating digital entrepreneurship beyond major metros. The platform's growth is underpinned by an expanding, resilient, and greener logistics network.

Flipkart's supply chain network saw a significant expansion of 35 lakh square feet, covering over 21,000 pin codes with a logistics network of more than 100 fulfilment centres, and rapidly scaling its quick commerce business with more than 450 new micro-fulfilment centres across 30 cities.

The company has doubled its EV last-mile fleet to more than 20,000, with nearly 70 per cent of grocery deliveries now made via EVs, and has also introduced electric long-haul trucks on routes such as DelhiJaipur, strengthening its commitment to sustainable operations.

Hemant Badri, Senior Vice President for Supply Chain, Minutes, and Customer Experience, said the festive season showed the strength of Flipkart's long-term investments.

"Our network has been built pin code by pin code for over a decade. This season, our supply chain demonstrated robust scale and resilience, managing a 24 per cent year-on-year growth in unit volumes, maintaining 99.9 per cent uptime on peak days, and operating with a significantly greener last-mile fleet. With over 60 per cent of orders coming from Tier 2 and 3 regions, it reaffirms that our infrastructure is built to serve all of India. We are proud to have delivered not just packages, but trust and celebration to millions of households across Bharat."  Underpinning the entire ecosystem is Flipkart's investment in technology to ensure a trusted and safe consumer experience.

Balaji Thiagarajan, Chief Product and Technology Officer, said, "Our platform is built for the future of commerce - a future defined by both massive scale and unshakeable trust. The number of users that seamlessly engaged on the platform grew by nearly 16 per cent this festive season compared to last year, demonstrating the exponential power of engineering at scale. Trust remains a defining factor in India's maturing e-commerce market. We have made deeper investments in platform safety and have delivered a 25 per cent reduction in account takeover frauds, 99.95 per cent accuracy in blocking malicious requests, and a 50 per cent cut in customer handling time through GenAI-powered support."  Across categories, Flipkart saw a balanced growth across fashion, home, beauty, electronics, and refurbished goods with rising repeat purchases in metros and non-metros, driven increasingly by reliability, convenience and selection - not offers alone. "As India's consumption story evolves, the platforms that will succeed are the ones that deliver access, affordability, and trust simultaneously," Rajneesh Kumar said. "That is the direction we have set for Flipkart.