Instacart May Be Up for Sale, and Uber and DoorDash Are the Names Mentioned

Instacart is in talks to sell itself, according to a report from The Information published on October 23, 2026. The same report said the grocery delivery company has hired an investment bank to help weigh its options. A sale would end the 14 years Instacart has operated as an independent company.

The two companies named as possible buyers are DoorDash and Uber. The Information reported that Instacart held acquisition talks with DoorDash. Bloomberg reported that Instacart also held sale talks with Uber, and that Uber later walked away. Bloomberg also said the Instacart discussions were early and might not lead to a sale. Reuters, reporting the same day, said Instacart had held preliminary talks with potential buyers, including Uber and DoorDash.

The stock market reacted quickly. Instacart shares closed at $56.44 after rising 9.2% on Friday, October 23, the first trading day after the reports. Uber's stock fell 3.4% that day, and DoorDash's shares also dropped, according to TechCrunch's October 24 coverage. That coverage put Instacart's market value above $13 billion. The share price is up 25% so far this year.

This is not the first time DoorDash has been linked to Instacart. In August 2021, Reuters reported that DoorDash had held talks to buy Instacart over the previous two months. That earlier effort did not lead to a deal.

Here is what is known so far. Instacart has hired an investment bank. It has held talks with at least two large app-based delivery companies, and one of them has reportedly stepped away. Bloomberg calls the talks early, and no price, valuation, or deal structure has been reported. A sale is a possibility being considered. It is not an agreed deal.

The broader context here is who could buy Instacart. Uber and DoorDash are the only two companies named, and either one would face antitrust review, the government check on deals that could reduce competition. Instacart connects shoppers, grocery stores, and customers, so a combination would touch all three.

In my view, the most useful way to read this sequence is as a question of leverage. A company worth more than $13 billion is being discussed as a target, and the shares of the possible buyers fell when the news broke. Investors seem to expect that a deal would move value to Instacart's shareholders, while the buyers would take on the cost and the difficulty of combining businesses.

For people who work in the sector, the real stakes lie in the software behind the app. Instacart's system for sending orders to stores, its system for assigning shoppers, and its links to grocery chains are the parts any buyer would need to take on. Those are also the parts most likely to be tested by a merger. Think of it as a dispatch center that has to keep working while it moves to a new owner. Whether a combined company would produce better orders, faster substitutions, and more accurate stock data, or simply one larger middleman between shoppers and stores, is not answered by the current reports.

For now, the reports describe an early process with named suitors, and one of them has withdrawn. The next clear signal would be a formal announcement from one of the parties. Until then, the facts are a possible sale, a sharp move in Instacart's stock, and two large competitors watching the same company.