Food delivery platforms are shifting their competitive strategies toward deeper exploration of "quality" and "value," with differentiation tactics set to reshape the industry landscape.

On September 10, MEITUAN-W announced that Dianping officially "relaunched" its premium delivery service. The platform will leverage B-end proprietary large language models combined with massive authentic review data analysis to understand user needs, further filtering out non-genuine review data to provide reliable decision-making through "AI + authentic high ratings."

The same day, Gaode announced the launch of its "Gaode Street Scanning Rankings." This echoes the late April launch of Taobao Flash Purchase, which achieved peak daily orders of 120 million, creating a complementary synergy.

Following the summer peak period for food delivery orders, what changes have emerged in the market landscape? According to JD.com's financial reports, new businesses including JD delivery services saw revenue surge 199% year-over-year. MEITUAN-W also reported significant order volume increases, with its core local commercial segment revenue growing 7.7% from RMB 60.7 billion in Q2 last year to RMB 65.3 billion. Alibaba China E-commerce Business Group CEO Jiang Fan stated that in August, Taobao Flash Purchase's monthly active buyers reached 300 million, a 200% increase from April. "After several months of development, we have exceeded expectations for our first-phase targets."

Subsidy policies have played a crucial role in this process, and the pace of subsidies has not slowed. According to MEITUAN-W's official announcement, on September 10, Dianping's "premium delivery" portal will distribute 25 million various types of large-value "premium delivery" consumption vouchers.

**Platform Advantages**

In fact, Dianping launched delivery services as early as 2014 and introduced "premium delivery" in 2016. In 2022, Dianping partnered with Meituan Delivery to launch a "premium delivery" portal, screening high-rated dine-in restaurants available for delivery.

"This relaunch of 'premium delivery' represents MEITUAN-W's upgrade of previous products based on new consumer demands, integrating resources from both platforms," said a Dianping representative.

The first batch of Dianping's "premium delivery" has assembled over one million high-rated quality dine-in merchants. As of September 10, more than 1,400 restaurants from the 2025 "Must-Eat List," nearly 30 restaurants from the 2025 "Black Pearl" list, and nearly 1,500 high-star hotel restaurants have joined Dianping's "premium delivery."

According to Dianping representatives, building on its existing quality merchant supply, Dianping further screens high-rated dine-in restaurants for "premium delivery" and displays merchant ratings and reviews on pages. These reviews are linked to tags like "Must-Eat List," "Chain," and "Established Store," effectively filling information gaps for consumers ordering delivery. Additionally, "premium delivery" recommends nearby high-rated small shops and community stores, distributing "dine-in merchant delivery vouchers" to encourage orders and help quality dine-in restaurants gain more online and offline incremental business.

Data shows that over the past year, Dianping accumulated 363 million authentic reviews, with daily average "photo review" views up 11% year-over-year. The negative review priority viewing rate reached 14%, with users prioritizing negative reviews up 36% year-over-year. Dianping representatives stated, "We will continue inviting more restaurants based on genuine customer ratings and authentic merchant operations."

Meanwhile, on September 9, JD.com and Jin Jiang Hotels officially signed a strategic cooperation agreement. Under the agreement, JD.com's 7Fresh Kitchen will enter multiple Jin Jiang Hotel brands across China. This move is widely interpreted as JD.com's key strategic expansion into delivery services and scenario-based dining services.

Simultaneously, Taobao Flash Purchase has leveraged Taobao's unique market scale and position to "quickly achieve phased results." Alibaba Group CEO Wu Yongming stated, "By integrating consumer platforms, we've generated significant synergies, driving monthly active consumers and daily order volumes to new highs."

From August 7-9, Taobao Flash Purchase's daily order volume exceeded 100 million for three consecutive days, marking a significant market milestone.

It's evident that from Dianping's deep cultivation of "premium delivery" to JD.com's hotel partnership approach to food delivery layout, while platforms compete intensively in increasingly fierce competition, they're also showing differentiated development paths. Platforms are transitioning from simple scale expansion to more refined, focused business integration and value creation.

Market reactions to changes in the food delivery competition landscape have varied.

Goldman Sachs believes delivery industry competition has altered the market structure, with Taobao Flash Purchase potentially capturing 45% market share. Goldman Sachs' latest research indicates that intensified competition since May has caused MEITUAN-W's Q2 losses to exceed expectations, with long-term market share potentially permanently declining.

"Food delivery isn't simply C-end competition; its core lies in supply chain resource integration and operations, deep cultivation of merchant service systems, and efficient delivery network construction. In these areas, MEITUAN-W has established deep moats with solid foundations," said Luo Xianliang, Vice President of Ries Strategy Consulting China, in an interview. "MEITUAN-W's industry leadership position is difficult to shake in the short term."

"JD delivery has indeed brought us some incremental orders, but current total order volume remains limited," a light meal brand representative told us. "MEITUAN-W remains our primary order source, though notably, growth from Taobao Flash Purchase has been very apparent. Previously, our business was concentrated in first and second-tier cities, but since launching on Taobao's main page, lower-tier market order volume has significantly increased."

Despite varied market opinions on delivery landscape changes, industry evolution is far from concluded. New competitors may still emerge, markets remain variable, and future unexpected changes are worth anticipating.

**Ongoing Competition**

Since the current "positioning battle" began in the delivery industry, major platforms have introduced diverse subsidy strategies with increasingly fierce competition. Recent Q2 financial reports show multiple platforms' profits significantly impacted by high subsidy investments.

Undeniably, some restaurant businesses have benefited from this traffic surge, particularly large chain brands. As Cha Baidao co-founder, executive director, and general manager Wang Hongxue stated, "The delivery wars brought phased opportunities to the industry, especially in July when overall order demand peaked significantly."

Yum China CFO Ding Xiao also acknowledged that large-scale enterprises like Yum China typically secure more favorable subsidy arrangements with higher platform subsidy ratios, though specific figures weren't disclosed for commercial confidentiality.

However, when smaller merchants are asked about actual delivery revenue, they often fall silent, offering the diplomatic response: "It depends on perspective."

One restaurant industry practitioner bluntly stated: "The delivery price war is essentially a battle between three major platforms. The so-called traffic from subsidies is merely a drop in the bucket for most stores. Those truly capable of handling traffic are already mature delivery operations."

Addressing industry ecosystem concerns, MEITUAN-W is also promoting "dine-in consumption" to maintain healthy restaurant industry ecology. MEITUAN-W has reportedly distributed up to RMB 50,000 in support funds to quality restaurant small businesses on its platform. Meituan Delivery has also launched a "dine-in revitalization" plan, distributing in-store consumption vouchers to all members to boost restaurant foot traffic and revenue quality.

"Instant retail and traditional e-commerce aren't zero-sum relationships," said Ouyang Rihui, Associate Dean of the China Internet Economy Research Institute at Central University of Finance and Economics. Instant retail's deep online-offline integration can bridge the online-offline retail gap, channeling online traffic back to offline entities for integrated development, creating complementary, win-win ecosystems.

Regarding delivery industry competition, the State Administration for Market Regulation responded on September 9. SAMR spokesperson Wang Qiuping stated that SAMR has promptly interviewed major delivery platforms, with relevant platforms responding quickly, collectively committing to strict legal compliance, eliminating unfair competition, resisting malicious subsidies, and promoting orderly industry development. Next, SAMR will closely monitor delivery industry competition, requiring improved service quality, strict food safety standards, and guaranteed consumer experiences; supervising platforms to reasonably control subsidies to avoid disrupting normal pricing systems; and promoting platform support for merchants while improving delivery worker rights protection to build win-win ecosystems for consumers, merchants, workers, and platforms.