India’s festive shopping boom is increasingly being fuelled by shoppers outside the country’s biggest cities, with e-commerce platforms reporting a strong start to the season as new customers come online, small-town demand gathers pace and consumers open their wallets for everything from electronics to fashion and beauty products.
Online sales are estimated to grow 25% to 29% year on year during the 2026 festive season, according to Bank of America’s latest report, High Frequency Data: Healthy Start to the Festive Season, citing Datum Intelligence. Early indicators from Amazon, Flipkart and Meesho point to a similar trend, with non-metro markets and first-time shoppers emerging as key drivers of demand.
At Amazon India’s Great Indian Festival, products ordered rose more than 100% year on year during the early phase of the sale, marking its biggest-ever start, according to Bank of America. First-time shoppers nearly doubled, while more than 72% of visits came from outside the top nine metros. More than one in three customers opted for equated monthly instalments, suggesting that retail credit is also helping support purchases.
Flipkart’s Big Billion Days, which began on October 9, drew 6.3 million concurrent users in its opening hour, six times the traffic of a regular hour, with new customers rising 34%. Non-metro customers accounted for around 60% of demand, according to Bank of America. Meesho’s Mega Blockbuster Sale also opened strongly, with orders rising around 75% year on year on day one and transacting customers increasing about 60%. Customers from Tier 3 and smaller towns shopping on Meesho Mall nearly tripled.
For e-commerce companies, this creates an opportunity to bring more households into the online shopping economy, while the growing participation of smaller businesses gives consumers access to a wider range of products.
Small businesses find a bigger festive market
Amazon India said overall seller sales during the first week of its Great Indian Festival grew 3.5 times compared with business as usual, while products sold more than twice as fast. The number of small and medium businesses crossing ₹10 lakh in sales increased more than 4.6 times, while the number of sellers crossing ₹1 crore rose more than 1.5 times.
Amazon recorded its highest-ever seller participation during the festival, with the number of participating small and medium businesses rising nearly 30% year on year. More than 70% of these businesses came from Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. The number of new sellers crossing ₹1 lakh in sales grew 2.4 times, while the number of new sellers reaching ₹10 lakh grew more than four times.
“Every festive season, we see inspiring stories of entrepreneurs reaching new customers and achieving significant milestones,” said Sachin Kaushik, vice president, Selling Partner Services, Amazon India. He said the company was particularly encouraged by the performance of new sellers, women entrepreneurs, artisans and small businesses, adding that entrepreneurs were reaching customers far beyond their local markets.
Jewellery, shoes, automotive products, major appliances and wireless products were among Amazon’s top five seller categories during the first week.
Flipkart’s data offers a similar picture. Across its 11-day Big Billion Days sale, unique visitors increased nearly 10% year on year, while orders, units sold and buyers each grew by around 20% to 22%. Nearly half of buyers were Gen Z consumers, and about 60% came from Tier 2 and smaller cities. Buyers in beauty, grooming and general merchandise rose 40%, while lifestyle buyers increased 12.5%.
Large appliances grew 30% year on year in Flipkart’s opening hour, while demand for big-ticket items remained nearly nine times that of a normal period through the sale. New customers on Flipkart Minutes, the company’s quick-commerce service, were 1.7 times the level seen on regular days.
Quick commerce and fashion see different festive patterns
The festive season is also changing how consumers shop for immediate needs. But Bank of America’s analysis suggests that the effect varies by category and platform. While e-commerce and fashion have seen a clear festive lift, quick commerce and food delivery have recorded more modest increases in daily active users during the sale period.
Blinkit’s monthly active users rose 53% year on year to around 58 million in September, according to Sensor Tower data cited by Bank of America. Yet its average daily active users during the first six days of the festive sale increased only 3% compared with September, while Zepto’s declined 2%. Food delivery platforms Zomato and Swiggy saw average daily active users rise by just 1% to 2% during the same period.
Zepto reported that festive wear orders grew 400% across key cities during Navratri, while sales of oxidised jewellery surged 40 times. Traditional lehenga choli was introduced on the platform, with Bengaluru leading orders for the outfit. Demand for dandiya sticks peaked at 6 pm on October 16, as consumers prepared for Garba celebrations.
Swiggy also recorded strong demand for fasting foods and traditional sweets around Navratri, Durga Puja and Dussehra. Between October 17 and October 20, it delivered an average of 1,794 sabudana dishes every hour across the country during the October 17 to 18 weekend. Sabudana khichdi and sabudana vada were among the most popular fasting dishes, alongside curated vrat thalis and preparations made with singhara, kuttu and rajgira.
Traditional sweet orders rose 36.4% during October 17 to 20 compared with the corresponding festive period last year.
The distinction is that quick commerce and food delivery appear to receive sharper bursts of demand around specific occasions rather than a sustained increase throughout the festive shopping window. On New Year’s Eve, for instance, Zomato and Swiggy’s daily active users rose around 57% and 38%, respectively, above normal levels.
Category-specific shopping, meanwhile, is providing a stronger lift to fashion. Myntra’s daily active users increased 40% during the first six days of festive sales compared with September, while its monthly active users grew 8% year on year to around 93 million. Nykaa Fashion’s monthly active users rose 24% year on year to approximately 17 million. Nykaa, which had around 20 million monthly active users in September, saw a more moderate festive increase in daily engagement, with its own promotional events continuing to drive sharper peaks.
For the wider market, the early numbers point to a healthy start, though the season is not over. Bank of America’s analysis covers a festive sale window running from October 9 to November 15, which gives an early reading of the final assessment of total sales.