Online grocery shopping returned to growth in 2026, with 56.3 percent of U.S. consumers purchasing groceries online in the past 12 months, up from 53.6 percent in 2025, according to Coresight Research‘s ninth annual US Online Grocery Survey.
The increase reverses two consecutive years of decline, and 58.7 percent of respondents said they expect to buy groceries online in the next 12 months.
The survey of 2,013 U.S. consumers, conducted June 4, found delivery has pulled far ahead of collection as the preferred fulfillment method. Among online grocery shoppers, 66.7 percent said they “mainly” had orders delivered in the past 12 months, compared with 31.2 percent who “mainly” collected them – a 35.5-percentage-point gap that marks the widest margin in the survey’s history.
Big names at top
The channel’s leaders remain non-traditional grocers. Walmart ranked as the most shopped online grocery retailer at 59.2 percent penetration, followed by Amazon at 45.1 percent, Target at 31.3 percent and Costco at 21.3 percent.
Kroger banners led pure-play grocery retailers at 16.8 percent, while Ahold Delhaize banners, Albertsons/Safeway and Publix each registered less than 10 percent. Discounters Dollar General and Family Dollar, at 12.4 percent and 10.8 percent, surpassed several traditional grocery chains in shopper penetration in the 2026 survey.
Sujeet Naik, analyst at Coresight Research, told The Shelby Report that independent and regional grocers facing that competitive gap should not try to match the largest players on their terms.
“I don’t think independent and regional grocers should try to beat Walmart or Amazon at their own game because that’s going to be incredibly difficult. Those companies have enormous scale and can invest much more heavily in technology, delivery and memberships,” Naik said. “Instead, regional grocers need to lean into what makes them different. They often have stronger fresh food offerings, more local products and closer relationships with their communities. The challenge is making sure those strengths come across online as well.”
He added that owning the customer relationship is becoming more important. “If retailers can use loyalty programs and customer data to personalize offers and make the shopping experience more relevant, that gives shoppers a reason to come back.”
Delivery expensive
Delivery’s dominance carries a cost. Coresight notes delivery costs more to fulfill than collection, with higher labor, transportation and packaging costs, and warns that retailers will need to lean on technology to protect margins.
For smaller operators without national scale, Naik said the answer is not choosing between delivery and curbside but balancing the two.
“For smaller grocers, delivery is expensive, and matching Walmart’s economics just isn’t realistic,” Naik said. “That’s why I think curbside pickup will continue to play an important role. It still offers customers a lot of convenience, but it’s much cheaper for retailers because it removes the last-mile delivery cost.
“My expectation is that most successful regional grocers will offer both. They will use delivery where it makes sense, but they will also continue encouraging curbside for customers who want convenience without paying delivery fees. It doesn’t have to be an either-or decision.”
Rapid delivery, defined as same-day or under two hours, has meanwhile moved beyond last-minute needs.
More than one-third (37.9 percent) of online grocery shoppers said they conducted “most” or “all, or almost all” of their online grocery shopping through rapid delivery in the past 12 months, and fresh fruit, vegetables, dairy, meat, fish and eggs were purchased through the channel at almost the same rate as packaged food.
Rural markets, where many independents operate, present a different timeline for rapid delivery, Naik said.
“I think it will happen, but probably much more gradually than in urban markets,” Naik said. “The economics are just very different. In rural areas, you have got fewer customers spread over much larger distances, so it’s much harder to make rapid delivery work profitably. Shoppers in those markets also tend to plan bigger grocery trips rather than placing lots of smaller orders.
“Because of that, I think we’ll see standard grocery delivery continue to expand first, while rapid delivery grows more selectively in larger towns where the economics are stronger.”
AI reshaping channel
The report also examines consumer attitudes toward artificial intelligence shopping assistants.
Overall, 36.3 percent of respondents said they are very or somewhat comfortable allowing AI to purchase groceries on their behalf without reviewing each order, and comfort runs far higher among Amazon Prime and Walmart+ members – early adopters, Coresight suggests, of agentic commerce.
Price and product comparison drew the most interest among AI features at 33.1 percent, though 26.8 percent of respondents said none of the listed features appealed to them.
In meal kits, the report flags an emerging opportunity: while 26 percent of all shoppers used a meal-kit service in the past 12 months, usage rose to 60.4 percent among GLP-1 users. HelloFresh led the market at 51.1 percent of subscribers, followed by Kroger-owned Home Chef and Blue Apron.
Coresight’s overall conclusion is that grocery e-commerce can no longer be treated as a secondary channel that flexes with demand but as a permanent part of the grocery proposition requiring the same discipline and investment as the physical store. For independents, Naik said the goal is dependability rather than speed.
“For most independent grocers, I don’t think the goal should be to promise groceries in 30 minutes,” he said. “The bigger opportunity is to offer a dependable online experience with reliable delivery and convenient pickup options. For many customers, consistency is actually more valuable than shaving another 20 or 30 minutes off the delivery time.”
The survey results carry a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percent at a 95 percent confidence interval.