What Swiggy and Zomato really cost a restaurant in 2026, and when going direct pays

A Swiggy or Zomato order costs a restaurant a negotiated commission of roughly a tenth to over a quarter of the order, plus GST on it, payment and distance fees, funded discounts and ads. Going direct pays when your own delivery, payment and marketing cost per order stays well below that, on orders customers would really place with you.

How much commission do Swiggy and Zomato charge?

Nobody publishes a rate card. Commissions are negotiated restaurant by restaurant, so the only on-record numbers come from the competition case and from the press, and most of them are old or second-hand.

The best primary source is the Competition Commission of India's 2022 order opening an investigation on the National Restaurant Association of India's (NRAI) complaint. NRAI told the CCI that commissions ran at 20% to 30%, that Zomato charged about 27.8% of order value and that Swiggy's went as high as 24%. Swiggy told the CCI its commissions varied from 10% to 24%, set by the restaurant's popularity, order volume, cuisine, location and tenure (CCI order, Case 16 of 2021). These are 2021 figures and one side's claims; neither platform has published an update.

More recent reporting is similar. In September 2025, Zomato's commissions were reported at 10% to 28%, before payment gateway fees and GST, with bigger brands getting better rates (Verdict Food Service, citing NDTV Profit). When Rapido pitched its rival service in 2025, the comparison it drew was with the 16% to 30% the two incumbents typically charge (MediaNama). Treat any single number you hear as a data point, not a benchmark; check your own contract.

What else comes off the payout?

The commission is only the first line. The charges below come out of the same order, and the figures are the ones we could source; your contract may differ.

The long-distance fee is reported differently by different outlets. Inc42 gave ₹15 at 4–6 km and ₹25 to ₹35 beyond 6 km, and reported that Zomato says total commission is capped at 30% of order value, which restaurants disputed (Inc42). One owner told MediaNama his effective commission rose from 16% to 25% after the fee came in (MediaNama).

The customer's platform fee is not your cost, but it raises what the customer pays. It rose from ₹2 in 2023 to ₹14.90 on Zomato by 2026 (MediaNama).

Are the platforms making a lot of money on this?

Not much, which is why rates are unlikely to fall far. Zomato's food delivery business made an adjusted EBITDA of ₹532 crore in Q4 FY26, or 5.5% of net order value, and the company expects margins to stay in the 5–6% range (Eternal Q4 FY26 letter). Swiggy's food delivery made 3.1% of gross order value in Q1 FY27, on GOV of ₹9,490 crore (Swiggy Q1 FY27 letter).

Most of what you pay goes to delivery riders, discounts and customer acquisition, not to platform profit. Swiggy's own definition of revenue lists commissions, advertising from restaurants, user fees and "business enablement services" (Swiggy). Ads are a growing share of that, so expect more pressure to buy visibility rather than lower commissions.

What are regulators doing about it?

The CCI case is still open. Its investigation arm reportedly found in 2024 that Zomato's exclusivity contracts and Swiggy's growth guarantees for exclusive restaurants broke competition law; both companies called the reports misleading, and the Commission has not ruled (MediaNama). The 2022 order also records NRAI's complaints about price parity and "data masking", where restaurants never see the customer's details (CCI).

Charging customers more on the app is allowed. In July 2026 the CCI threw out a complaint from a customer who paid ₹198 on Zomato for a dish that cost ₹105 in the restaurant. It found no case, since the app price covers platform and delivery services (MediaNama). So you can price the app menu higher to cover the cost of the channel.

What does ordering direct cost?

Less per order, but you carry the delivery and the marketing. Evidence on alternatives is thin, so here is what we could confirm.

• Your own site or app: a payment gateway such as Razorpay charges 2% plus 18% GST on cards, UPI and netbanking. UPI has no merchant discount rate under RBI policy, so a customer paying your own UPI QR costs you nothing in fees (Razorpay). You still need an ordering system and riders or a delivery partner, and those costs vary by city.
• Phone and WhatsApp orders: the cheapest channel, and the most error-prone. Budget for someone to answer.
• Rapido's Ownly: it charged restaurants no commission, marketing or subscription fee as of March 2026, with customers paying a flat ₹30 delivery fee. Rapido said it would not earn money at first (MediaNama), so do not count on those terms lasting.
• ONDC: there is no single published commission. Buyer and seller apps set their own. Ola paused food delivery on its app and on ONDC in late 2025, and total retail orders on the network fell by more than 5% between January and August 2025 (MediaNama). The savings exist, but volumes are small and uneven.

Worked example: a ₹500 order, both ways

These numbers are illustrative, not quotes. We assume a 22% commission, 18% GST on platform charges, a 1.84% payment fee, a ₹30 restaurant-funded discount and no distance fee. For the direct order, we assume a gateway at 2% plus GST, ₹60 to a third-party rider and ₹25 per order spent on bringing the customer back.

The direct order saves ₹73.86. Now add the fixed cost. If an ordering site, a phone line and staff time cost ₹15,000 a month, you need about 203 direct orders a month, roughly seven a day, before you are ahead. And those orders must be ones you would otherwise have lost or paid commission on, not ones that simply move from dine-in.

Run your own numbers in our delivery margin calculator and break-even calculator.

So when does going direct pay?

When you already have repeat customers close by. Direct ordering rarely finds new customers; the aggregators do that well. It pays for regulars, office lunches and bulk orders within a few kilometres, where your delivery cost is low and customers already know you.

A workable split for most operators:

1. Stay on both apps for discovery, and price the app menu to cover its real cost.
2. Put your own ordering link, UPI QR and phone number on every bag and bill.
3. Give regulars a reason to order direct, such as a standing offer that costs less than the commission you save.
4. Track direct orders a month and the saving per order against your fixed cost. If you cannot clear the break-even in three months, scale back.