What is Rappi: history of a successful delivery app in Latin America

Rappi is one of the largest startups in Latam, valued in $5.2 billion dollars: we tell you its story and evolution.
Teléfono mostrando el logo de Rappi, colocado sobre una mesa junto a cubiertos; ideal para marketing de aplicaciones de entrega y comida a domicilio.
March 12, 2025
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Rappi is a Colombian app that was created in August 2015 by Simon Borrero, Felipe Villamarín, and Sebastián Mejía. The three of them knew that their app wasn’t the first one to offer food delivery services, so they looked for an innovative strategy to capture users’ attention. It is valued in 5,25 billion.

Now it’s one of the largest startups in Latam. It was recognised as the Colombian Superapp by the CEO of Softbank in 2019 as a result of their focus on the latinoamerican market. TIME magazine has highlighted Rappi as one of the most important companies. This recognition underscores the relevance and impact that the Colombian platform has had on eCommerce and digital services in Latin America.

History of Rappi

The app started becoming popular when they started promoting it by giving away donuts in exchange for downloads. They also added the “Rappi Antojo” button, which allowed users to order anything they wanted and have it delivered directly to their homes.

In the blink of an eye, Rappi managed to position itself as one of the leading apps in Latin America. Rappi has made its way into 60 cities and 72 municipalities in Colombia. It has also achieved a presence in eight other countries in the region: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru and Uruguay.

To date, the company has 2,000 direct employees, 2,000 people in charge of providing support and assistance in the customer service area, and 60,000 independent delivery drivers only in Colombia.

The latter receive various benefits, such as access to credit, medical assistance, scholarships, customer service courses, gasoline discounts, vehicle and maintenance discounts, accident insurance, and life insurance, among others.

What makes Rappi special is that it has the ability to bring the consumer closer to any type of product or service they require without the need to travel and bringing it to their doorstep in the shortest time possible. It’s practically like having a mall inside an application.

The company is convinced that by bringing ordinary people closer to businesses, its development is promoted, transforming businesses and simplifying consumers’ lives. All of this is achieved through its application, where users connect with businesses close to their location.

In 2023, Rappi achieved its first year of financial stability and reported annual net revenue of approximately 800 million dollars. Additionally, the company announced an investment of 110 million dollars in Mexico to expand its Rappi Turbo service, which promises food and pharmaceutical product deliveries in just 10 minutes. This innovation has set a new standard in rapid commerce, highlighting Rappi’s ability to provide advanced and efficient logistical solutions.

Now, there are more than 30 million users in their app.

How is the Rappi app

The app stands out for having an interactive interface that gets personalized according to users’ interests. That is, it collects information from your order history and then tells you about the offers that are approaching your tastes and needs.

Arppi App
Rappi App Source: Apple Store

Rappi decided to listen to the needs of its users in order to create the best service. This is how, in a few months, it incorporated restaurants, fast food chains, pharmacies, supermarkets and even ATM services and favors.

They have three types of clients:

  • Consumers: who are given access to a wide variety of services and products that are delivered in minutes (as mentioned above): paying bills, carrying packages from one place to another, running errands, etc.
  • Entrepreneurs: who are given access to shipping, business intelligence, payments and financial services so they can grow, stay competitive or succeed. This also applies to restaurants, retailers, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
  • Delivery drivers: who are given the opportunity to turn their time and skills into income in their spare time.

They also offer a service of traveling through Colombia, called RappiTravel. It is similar to other travelling apps such as Booking or Airbnb, with the competitive advantage of knowing colombian consumer and territory. This allows them to give the most customized options to their clients.

rappitravel

What can you find in Rappi app

Rappi is a food delivery, grocery, and pharmacy app. As with any delivery app, the user can go to their favorite restaurant’s profile and order whatever they feel like enjoying to have it delivered right to their doorstep. The same option applies to supermarkets and pharmacies.

In this way, the user can order from the app all of the products they want to have in their pantry and someone from Rappi will take care of going to the supermarket, buying everything on the list, and bringing it to the home of whoever placed the order. It’s an option for saving time and enjoying the comfort of being at home.

As for pharmacy service, it is very similar to that of a market. Rappi takes care of finding the medication and bringing it to your home so that you don’t have to leave with that illness that has you bedridden.

Among the sectors (and companies) present within the application that have grown the most during 2023, the following stand out:

  • Technology: highlighting companies such as De Película 101, Éxito, Ishop, Los Novedosos and Mac Center.
  • Fashion: comprising brands such as Americanino, Chevignon, Mango, Naf Naf and Prochampions.
  • Home: represented by names such as Casa Ideas, Home Sentry, Imusa, Inkanta and Miniso.
  • Beauty: where companies such as Blind, Blush Bar, Cromantic, L’Occitane and Loto del sur stand out.
  • Bookstores and gifts: represented by companies such as Acentos, El Tipo, Happy Books and Lerner.

What can you order at Rappi

Obviously, you can make the typical order in which you add products to your cart, put your address, pay and receive the product(s) you ordered. But Rappi has innovated by offering other services in addition:

  • Rappi Cash: is the option to bring cash to the user wherever they need it. The company realized the need of users to have cash at their fingertips, so they activated an ATM service to receive money from any site.
  • Rappi Favor: is a service where the customer pays by hour a worker of the company, who is known as Rappi Tendero and does the tasks you need like carrying an object from one place to another , go pay your bills and even walk your dog.

Colaborations

From 2020 to 2023, Rappi has closed important alliances with brands such as Makro, Bayonet and WhatsApp. In addition to this, they included Maluma, the colombian singer, as a commercial partner. He would work in the creative and visual part, in addition to including themes of urban culture on which his career is based, with the purpose of expanding the app’s frontiers.

You can opt to a express delivery in only 35 minutes with their service “Express”.

How to use RappiPay and RappiCard

Rappipay is their own payment method along with DaviPlata (a service from the colombian Davivienda Bank). This platforms allows its users to pay securely with their debid card. As for the RappiPay debit card, it is accepted in any establishment (physical or online) in the world, as it is backed by Visa.

They also hace a credit card called “RappiCard”. It has some difference compared with RappiPay:

  • RappiCard does not have printed numbers, except for the last 4 digits to make payments in physical stores, and when paying with dataphone you will have to provide them.
  • When the user wants to buy online, they will have to enter into the Rappi app, access RappiPay and select RappiCard in order to see all the card digits.

Some of the advantages of using RappiCard are Cashback up to 5% on purchases within RappiTravel on flights and hotels and Cashback of 1% on purchases in digital and physical stores.

Where you can use Rappi app

The main cities where Rappi operates regionally:

  • Argentina: Rappi is present in 50 cities across the country, with the highest activity and order volume in Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Rosario, Mendoza, and La Plata.
  • Brazil: The service reaches nearly 100 cities, but the highest demand comes from São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Belo Horizonte.
  • Chile: Rappi operates in at least 24 cities, with Santiago, Viña del Mar, Antofagasta, La Serena, and Iquique experiencing the most activity.
  • Colombia: The company is active in 60 cities, but Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, and Barranquilla account for the majority of orders.
  • Costa Rica: It has limited operations in the country, being present only in two provinces: San José and Heredia.
  • Ecuador: Rappi operates in 11 cities, with the highest sales in Quito, Guayaquil, and Manta.
  • Mexico: The service is available in over 100 cities, with strong demand in Monterrey, Guadalajara, Puebla, Mérida, and Querétaro.
  • Peru: Rappi is present in 11 cities, with Lima, Arequipa, and Trujillo leading in demand.
  • Uruguay: The company operates only in Montevideo and Punta del Este.

 

Image: Depositphotos

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