DoorDash was founded in January 2013 by Stanford students Tony Xu, Stanley Tang, Andy Fang and Evan Moore. It started as PaloAltoDelivery.com, a single web page with PDF menus and the founders' phone number, and the founders delivered the first orders themselves. The company joined Y Combinator that summer and took the DoorDash name.
The suburban strategy
While rivals concentrated on dense downtowns, DoorDash expanded into suburbs and smaller cities. Suburban orders tend to be larger family meals, roads are easier for Dashers, and fewer competitors meant DoorDash could build merchant selection and courier coverage first. By 2019 it had overtaken Grubhub as the U.S. leader by consumer spending, according to Bloomberg Second Measure.
DashPass, the pandemic and the IPO
DashPass, launched in 2018, gave members $0 delivery fees on eligible orders for a monthly fee and pushed up order frequency. Demand surged during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns, and DoorDash listed on NASDAQ in December 2020 at $102 per share.
From delivery app to local commerce platform
DoorDash added groceries, convenience, retail and its own DashMart stores, built an advertising business, and sold software and white-label delivery to merchants. It acquired Wolt in 2022, then SevenRooms and Deliveroo in 2025. Revenue reached $13.7 billion in 2025 with $935 million in net income, and Q2 2026 revenue rose 36% to $4.45 billion on 970 million orders.
The main risk
DoorDash depends on independent Dashers. Worker-classification rules, minimum-pay ordinances and fee caps can raise costs in major markets, while Uber Eats and grocery players compete for the same orders. Heavy 2026 spending on Deliveroo, AI and autonomous delivery is the company's bet that scale and new categories will outweigh those pressures.