Same-day delivery once represented the outer edge of ecommerce speed. Now, retailers are promising orders in three hours, one hour, 30 minutes, or less.
Some purchases become much more valuable when they can arrive at the moment a customer needs them; ultrafast delivery gives retailers a way to capture those purchases instead of losing them to the nearest available store.
The model is expanding beyond restaurant meals and groceries. In the past few years, beauty products, electronics, household essentials, and home improvement supplies have entered delivery networks built around minutes rather than days. Here’s how.
What qualifies as ultrafast delivery?
There is no formal industry cutoff. Ultrafast delivery is shaping up to be fulfillment within three hours of checkout, with “instant” or “on demand” services usually targeting 60 minutes or less.
Think of it like this: Same-day delivery can still mean an order placed in the morning arrives that evening. Ultrafast service requires inventory to be close enough for immediate picking and local transport. The promise depends on the customer’s address, order time, available inventory, and delivery capacity.
Customer interest is real, though not unlimited. Capital One’s Same Day Delivery Statistics found that 70% of shoppers are more likely to buy online when same-day delivery is available, 23% would pay extra for delivery within three hours, and 43% have abandoned a purchase because delivery was too slow. Yet consumers remain more likely to value free shipping than speed. The winning offer is an option for urgent orders, not a blanket upgrade forced onto every cart.
How major retailers are delivering in minutes
Fast service begins with inventory placement. Retailers are shortening the distance between the product and the customer through neighborhood fulfillment sites, store-based picking, courier platforms, and drones.
Amazon Now uses small fulfillment locations near densely populated areas to deliver thousands of items in 30 minutes or less. By mid-2026, it was expanding across dozens of U.S. cities. Amazon also offers one- and three-hour delivery on more than 90,000 products through its Same-Day network.
Walmart is using its store footprint as a local inventory network and testing an even shorter last mile. In May 2026, the retailer reported more than one million completed drone deliveries. The average flight took 23 minutes, while its fastest order arrived in four minutes and 44 seconds.
The Home Depot shows why the model can work outside traditional quick-commerce categories. Its nationwide Express Delivery service uses more than 2,000 U.S. stores as fulfillment hubs to deliver eligible project supplies in three hours or less. It builds on the retailer’s partnerships with DoorDash and Uber Eats, which put select products on familiar on-demand apps.
If a contractor runs out of caulk or a homeowner is one bag of fertilizer short, waiting until tomorrow can stop the project. Rapid delivery helps The Home Depot preserve that sale while reinforcing a larger message: Keep working, and the retailer can bring the missing piece.
Which products are a strong fit?
The best ultrafast delivery products solve an immediate need, are easy to pick, and can travel economically in a passenger vehicle or small drone.
| Product category | Why speed matters | Typical orders |
| Grocery and household essentials | Frequent use creates urgent replenishment needs | Dinner ingredients, diapers, detergent |
| Health and personal care | The customer may need the item the same day | Cold medicine, sunscreen, contact solution |
| Beauty | Purchases are often tied to an event, trip, or depleted staple | Foundation, hair products, fragrance gifts |
| Small electronics | A missing accessory can interrupt work or travel | Chargers, earbuds, printer ink |
| Home improvement | A low-cost missing item can delay a high-value project | Fasteners, drill bits, adhesives |
Beauty is especially well suited because products are generally compact, valuable for their size, and often time-sensitive. DoorDash has added more than 400,000 beauty and personal-care products since entering the category in 2021. Ulta Beauty uses DoorDash for on-demand marketplace orders and for same-day orders placed through Ulta’s own site and app.
Demand is broader than occasional emergencies. Amazon reported that groceries and everyday essentials accounted for half of the more than eight billion same- or next-day items delivered to U.S. Prime members in 2025. Speed is moving into routine replenishment.
When is ultrafast delivery worth the cost?
Brands are finding that it’s worth testing when urgency changes the buying decision. They may gain conversion, prevent a store trip, or win an order that would otherwise go to a nearby competitor. The service can also support a product launch or last-minute gifting without resetting the brand’s standard shipping promise.
The economics still need scrutiny. Courier fees can consume the margin on a low-value order. Smaller assortments may create stockouts, while inventory spread across too many nodes can raise carrying costs. Immediate picking also leaves little room to correct an inventory error. Instead, brands should take the following steps:
- Start with a defined radius, a short list of high-urgency SKUs, and a clear fee or order threshold.
- Measure incremental conversion and repeat purchase against the full cost per delivery.
- If faster orders simply replace profitable standard orders, the program is moving revenue rather than creating it.
Ultrafast delivery is not yet a necessity for every category. Reliable two-day delivery may matter far more for considered purchases, bulky goods, or low-margin products. What is becoming necessary is choice: Customers should be able to pay for speed when the need is real without subsidizing it on every order.
Can smaller brands offer ultrafast delivery through a 3PL?
Yes, but only with the right local setup. A conventional parcel order leaving a regional 3PL is unlikely to reach a customer in 30 minutes. The inventory must already sit close to the delivery address, and the warehouse needs late order cutoffs, real-time inventory accuracy, rapid picking, and a local courier handoff.
A brand can pilot the service from one 3PL facility in a dense market, using a white-label network such as DoorDash Drive On-Demand where eligible. Non-restaurant retail onboarding is evaluated case by case and may require multiple locations. Another path is placing select inventory with Amazon, Walmart, or Target, whose nearby nodes can support faster options. Placement does not guarantee ultrafast eligibility, but it lets a smaller brand participate without building its own fleet.
The practical goal is not to match Amazon everywhere but to identify the products, customers, and cities where an hour changes the outcome. Then, build a promise that fulfillment operations can keep.
