India’s instant home services market is rapidly emerging as the next major battleground in the country’s consumer internet sector, with companies including Urban Company, Pronto and Snabbit pouring millions of dollars into ultra-fast domestic labour delivery even as losses mount and profitability remains uncertain.
The shift marks the latest evolution of India’s quick-commerce boom, where the promise of 10-minute grocery deliveries is now extending to household chores such as cleaning, dishwashing, laundry and meal preparation.
Urban Company said its rapid-response home services platform InstaHelp, launched only this financial year, delivered 2.7 million orders and a net transaction value of Rs 40 crore in the March quarter, with March alone crossing 1.1 million orders. The business reported an adjusted EBITDA loss of Rs 119 crore during the quarter as the company sharply increased spending on customer acquisition, supply onboarding and micro-market expansion.
“We are investing to win, and we intend to stay ahead,” cofounder and chief executive Abhiraj Singh Bhal said during the company’s earnings call.
The company’s aggressive push comes amid a surge of investor interest in instant home services startups. Earlier this month, Pronto raised $20 million in fresh funding from venture capitalist Lachy Groom, doubling its valuation to $200 million within two months. The company said its daily bookings had jumped from 3,000 in December to more than 26,000 currently.
Snabbit, another fast-growing player in the segment, raised $56 million in April in a funding round led by Susquehanna Venture Capital, Mirae Asset Venture Investments and Bertelsmann India Investments. The company said it crossed one million monthly jobs in March.
Recently, in a report, Morgan Stanley said combined monthly active users across Urban Company, Pronto and Snabbit reached 10.4 million in March, underlining the rapid adoption of app-based home services.
Investors and founders say the category is being driven by changing urban lifestyles, rising dual-income households and increasing consumer willingness to outsource routine chores.
However, companies acknowledge that the business remains heavily loss-making as platforms race to lock in neighbourhood-level supply density and customer loyalty.
Urban Company lost about Rs 447 on every InstaHelp order, Bhal said. “InstaHelp lost Rs 447 per order in Q4, higher than Rs 381 it lost on every order in Q3.”
“The next 24-36 months are likely to be very burn-heavy,” a BofA Securities note cited. Unlike grocery delivery, the instant home services business depends on managing a fragmented labour force where service quality, trust and worker availability directly affect repeat usage.
Industry executives say the sector is also beginning to formalise parts of India’s largely unorganised domestic labour market by offering workers fixed payouts, flexible shifts and app-based work allocation.