DoorDash to buy Instacart in $17 billion cash and stock deal

DoorDash agreed Thursday to acquire rival Instacart in a transaction valued at about $17 billion, ending Instacart's run as an independent company. The deal mixes cash and stock, with DoorDash paying $65 per share. That price sits roughly 25% above Instacart's Oct. 22 closing price, the day media reports first said the company was considering a sale.

The companies said the combined operation would hand grocers and retailers access to DoorDash's delivery network alongside Instacart's grocery and fulfillment technology. DoorDash also told customers that folding DashPass and Instacart+ into a single membership could save them an estimated $100 million per year in fees. The merger is expected to close in the coming months.

DoorDash chief executive and cofounder Tony Xu said grocery delivery demands care that is hard to automate. "Grocery is one of the hardest things to get right online. Someone has to pick a ripe avocado, find a substitute you'd choose yourself, and get the ice cream to you before it melts," Xu said in a statement. He added that Instacart "has spent years learning to do that well for grocers, while DoorDash has built a delivery network and technology that local stores rely on every day. Together, we could give stores of every size more of those tools and unlock the potential of grocery delivery."

The deal arrives as competitors push deeper into same-day grocery service. Amazon now operates 2,300 locations for same-day grocery delivery, Walmart offers 30-minute delivery in some areas, and Uber recently signed a partnership with Costco. DoorDash has already moved beyond meal delivery, adding restaurant reservations and partnerships with Home Depot and Sephora.

The American Economic Liberties Project, an anti-monopoly advocacy group, is urging regulators to reject the merger. Lee Hepner, the group's senior legal counsel, said the combination would control nearly 60% of the third-party grocery delivery market. "Instacart and Doordash have spent the better part of a decade bullying main street businesses and denying fair pay and benefits to their combined 9 million workers," Hepner said in a statement. "This merger represents the next frontier of data-driven abuse, exploiting massive asymmetries of power to squeeze worker compensation on the way in and drain consumer wallets on the way out."

The transaction follows a run of consolidation across delivery services. Grubhub's U.S. business sold to Wonder for $650 million in 2025, Uber bought European company Delivery Hero for $14.8 billion this summer, and Uber acquired Postmates for $2.65 billion in 2020. Instacart went public in 2023.