On Saturday, when 3.5 crore viewers were captivated by the India-Pakistan match on Disney Hotstar, setting a record, the government-endorsed Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) achieved a personal best by receiving 65,400 pure retail orders in a single day.

These orders were received from 600 cities, with 47% of them originating from the food and beverages sector. Various seller apps, representing major players in the food and beverages sector on ONDC, also noted a significant surge in orders on Saturday, unlike anything they had experienced before.

According to them, factors such as the cricket match, eve of Navratri, enticing discounts, the weekend, and numerous buyer apps contributed to this surge. Buyer apps refer to consumer-facing applications where individuals can place orders. Furthermore, there were an additional 100,000 taxi/auto rides in the mobility sector from four cities.

The top cities in terms of order volume were Delhi (7,852), Bengaluru (7,586), Mumbai (3,770), Pune (3,729), and Hyderabad (3,231). Furthermore, over 70 cities placed more than 100 orders on the platform. Other categories that played a role in the increased order activity on Saturday include fashion (25%), electronics (9%), grocery (8%), home and kitchen (7%), beauty and personal care (3%), and health and wellness (1%).

According to a source, the increase was influenced by the addition of more seller apps and buyer apps, as well as the introduction of special offers by both parties.

“Magicpin, uEngage, GrowthFalcons, bitsila, and EkSecond are the main food seller apps. Most buyer apps are allowing their buyers to order food too,” the source said.

Sameer Sharma, the Founder and CEO of uEngage, a platform aiding restaurants in reducing aggregator commissions, stated that they received over 4,000 orders on Saturday, marking the highest single-day order count on ONDC thus far.

“We haven’t done so many orders in the past. On an average, it is 1,000 to 2,500 orders per day from ONDC on uEngage,” he said. “New buyer apps who have joined like NoBrokerHood, Ola, Paytm are pushing for more traffic on ONDC, Pincode has garnered millions of downloads now, and Magicpin’s contribution has also grown a lot,” Sharma said.

He mentioned that the India-Pakistan match has consistently been highly appealing to consumers, identifying it as a significant contributing factor. Additionally, he noted that being a pre-Navratri day played a role in the collective surge of orders.

Girish Pai, CEO of GrowthFalcons, expressed satisfaction with their Saturday experience, highlighting it as highly positive. He added that they successfully onboarded over 5,000 merchants onto ONDC.

“All these restaurants are now visible on multiple buyer apps like Paytm, magicpin, Ola, Pincode, and Nobrokerhood. Ola and Nobrokerhood have also forayed into food and beverages, and you can order food there too,” Pai said.

The visibility and demand have increased. “With Navratri, World Cup matches, especially the India-Pakistan match over the weekend, played a role in the increase. We saw orders increase by four times on Saturday compared to a normal day,” he said.

Presently, the network boasts a presence of over 40,000 active sellers across 200+ cities. Its growth trajectory has seen a remarkable ascent, starting from 1,000 transactions in January and culminating in an impressive cumulative total of over 3.3 million transactions in September.

ONDC does not fall under the categories of an application, platform, intermediary, or software. Instead, it constitutes a set of specifications meticulously crafted to encourage open, unbundled, and interoperable networks.