Swiggy clocks over 9,000 orders, Zomato crosses 7,000 orders per minute on New Year's Eve

India's dominant food tech platforms Zomato and Swiggy slugged it out on New Year's Eve, clocking record numbers, as many decided to party indoors and order food online amidst the Omicron scare. For the second year in a row, both platforms saw overwhelming demand online, beating their own previous records.

While Zomato touched a high of 7,100 orders per minute, Swiggy crossed the 9,000 orders per minute mark as of 8:20 pm on December 31, 2021. Both platforms typically clock over 1.5 million orders a day. While Zomato's previous record was over 4,000 orders per minute, Swiggy clocked over 5,000 orders per minute last New Year's Eve. Both platforms clocked over 2 million orders each, compared to the 1.3-1.5 million they usually clock in a day.

The frenetic pace of online orders tested the UPI digital payment infrastructure, with many users complaining of failed payments. Zomato founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal said the UPI success rate was drastically down across all apps, at 40% from 70%.

While Goyal gave high-frequency numbers on orders per minute, live orders and the kind of items seeing traction, Majety also gave context on Swiggy's growth numbers compared to what it was in 2014 when it launched.

While the final data clocked by both platforms is expected closer to midnight, both platforms are likely to enter January with healthy user numbers. It has also been a significant year for both companies, with Zomato getting listed on the public markets and Swiggy doubling down on its grocery service Instamart, even as it is in talks with investors to raise funds at a valuation of $10 Billion.