Zomato, Swiggy to Share Customer Data With Restaurants

Zomato is in final-stage discussions with the National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI) to begin sharing customer data with restaurants, a development that MediaNama independently confirmed with NRAI. The move comes alongside an in-app consent prompt that now asks users whether they want their phone numbers shared directly with restaurants for marketing and promotional updates. According to ET, which first reported the development, NRAI has also begun similar conversations with Swiggy.

This marks a major shift in a dispute that has lasted nearly a decade. For years, restaurants have asked for basic customer visibility to understand who their diners are and how to engage them, while platforms refused on the grounds that sharing contact details could compromise privacy, lead to spam, and undermine user trust. The fact that Zomato is now testing consent-based sharing indicates a clear change from that position and brings renewed attention to the long-running friction between aggregators and restaurants.

The timing adds another layer of significance. The discussions come at a moment when food delivery platforms are dealing with both competitive shifts and regulatory scrutiny, which makes the rollout far more consequential than a routine feature update.

How does the Zomato proposal currently work?

Zomato’s new consent prompt focuses only on phone numbers. The prompt asks users whether they want restaurants to receive their contact details for marketing and promotional updates. Users see two choices: Share my phone number or Do not share my phone number. The screen also includes an important line that says “once shared, this info cannot be withdrawn.” This means users cannot revoke their consent after sharing their number with a restaurant.

The prompt also notes that users agree to Zomato’s Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy when they consent. The company told MediaNama on background that customers have to give consent on the final checkout screen before any data is shared.

According to ET, Zomato and restaurant partners are still in discussions about how the shared data will be used and what limits will apply. Zomato has not publicly explained how consent withdrawal, retention or other obligations under the Digital Personal Data Protection Act will work in practice.

It is also not clear whether this model will expand beyond phone numbers. At the moment, the prompt covers only contact details. Restaurants often rely on deeper behavioural patterns when they plan marketing, such as ordering frequency, cuisine choices, spending ranges and neighbourhood trends. Zomato has not clarified whether it will consider sharing any of these deeper insights in the future, and the company has not provided public clarity on how broad the data-sharing…