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“Your margin is my opportunity.” — Jeff Bezos
That quote is old enough to be on T-shirts. But every time Amazon enters a new industry, it feels freshly threatening.
This time, it’s India’s ₹20,000 crore diagnostics market.
Last week, Amazon officially entered India’s diagnostics market. Not as a side hustle, but as a serious vertical under its growing healthcare arm. The service now live in six cities: Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi, Gurgaon, Noida, and Hyderabad.
It covers over 450 PIN codes, offers 800+ tests, and promises doorstep sample collection in under an hour. Reports for most routine tests arrive within six hours. All of this is available inside the familiar Amazon app, under a new banner: Amazon Medical.
But here’s the real story: the stock market caught on. Shares of nearly every listed diagnostic firm from Krsnaa Diagnostics to Suraksha, Thyrocare to Metropolis dipped nearly 2-3% as the news started trickling out. Mostly because when Amazon steps in, it usually means lower prices, tighter margins, and a new standard for convenience.
It may sound like a product launch. But it’s actually Amazon’s most careful step yet in building a healthcare ecosystem in India. And this time, it’s not experimenting.
Wait, but what is Amazon doing in diagnostics?
Amazon has tried this space before. Its e-pharmacy platform offers medicine delivery. It launched tele-consultations to help users access doctors online. But adoption has been modest. Those services still feel transactional due to lack of trust, disconnection and low frequency. What Amazon needed was the middle layer. A reason to connect symptoms, doctors, and medicines into one flow. Diagnostics offered that anchor.
When someone feels unwell, they either Google symptoms or see a doctor. If the doctor prescribes a test, patients usually visit a local lab or hospital. Amazon wasn’t part of that journey until now. Diagnostics closes that loop. A doctor consultation on Amazon can now lead to a test, which then leads to a medicine order, all within one integrated platform.
But why diagnostics, and why now?
Because the opportunity is massive… and messy. India’s diagnostics market was worth $12 billion in FY24 and is growing at 8% CAGR. Analysts expect it to touch $20 billion by FY30. But here’s the twist: 85% of this market is illness-driven. Most Indians get tested only when something’s already wrong.
Preventive testing: regular health checks when you're not sick, makes up just 12% of the market. And that’s where the biggest untapped potential lies.
That’s the space Amazon wants to shape.
It’s not entering with discounts. In fact, Amazon Medical’s leadership has made it clear: no price wars. Diagnostic pricing is tightly linked to perceived trust and quality. A test that’s too cheap makes people suspicious. So Amazon is entering at market price parity, aiming to win with consistency, reliability, and brand equity not with coupons.
And it’s not building this from scratch. Instead, Amazon has partnered with Bengaluru-based startup Orange Health Labs; a fast-growing diagnostics company backed by Accel, Y Combinator, and General Catalyst. Orange Health is known for building what it claims is the world’s fastest reverse logistics system for medical samples.
Sample pickups are completed in as little as 30 minutes. Labs are highly automated. Reports are reviewed in a two-tier clinical process. Everything, from booking to address validation to report delivery is fully digital and built to scale.
This is a direct response to how broken the diagnostics experience is today. In fact, there are over 1 lakh labs across India, yet fewer than 2% are NABL-accredited. In many rural and semi-urban areas the labs operate without audits, quality checks or standardised protocols.
Even something as routine as a blood test can give you different results depending on which lab you go to. Misdiagnoses aren’t uncommon either.
Amazon sees this as a gap worth solving. Not by becoming the biggest lab chain, but by setting a new benchmark for what consumers should expect. Just like it did with delivery speed and customer support in e-commerce.
But the bigger challenge is consumer behaviour.
In India, people don’t test unless they feel unwell. Preventive care isn’t a habit. Most consumers think, “Why spend on a test when I feel fine?” This mindset is what Amazon is up against. It's the same challenge insurance faces: people don’t buy unless forced to. Building this market means changing not just services, but psychology.
That’s also why Amazon isn’t trying to compete directly with hospitals; not yet. Hospitals still dominate serious illness testing, where patients want to be under clinical supervision. Amazon’s real bet is on routine and preventive diagnostics: the segment that’s under-penetrated, under-served, but quietly growing.
And if Amazon can make people test early and regularly; say, once a year or even twice, it unlocks more frequent use of consultations, prescription renewals, and medicine orders. That creates a sticky user loop. One that keeps customers inside the Amazon Medical ecosystem without forcing them to install another app or search for lab codes online.
This isn’t about dominating diagnostics but about embedding into your health routine.
To be clear, disruption won’t happen overnight. Incumbents like Dr. Lal PathLabs, Thyrocare, Metropolis and others have deep brand equity, especially in Tier I cities. Hospitals will continue to be the go-to for serious cases.
But what Amazon brings is scale, software, and an understanding of how to build habits. If it can apply its core strengths: logistics, user trust, operational scale to the notoriously patchy diagnostics market, it could raise the bar for everyone.
And in the process, it may create a new kind of healthcare stack, one that begins and ends inside your Amazon account.
Final pour
Amazon doesn’t need to become your doctor. It just wants to become the default layer beneath your health decisions. And diagnostics is the trojan horse. If it can get millions of Indians to book tests the way they buy books, it won’t just capture market share. It’ll reshape how India thinks about being healthy in the first place.
FAQs
Why is Amazon entering the diagnostics market in India?
Amazon is entering India’s ₹20,000 crore diagnostics market to build a connected healthcare ecosystem. Diagnostics offer a crucial middle layer between doctor consultations and medicine delivery—something Amazon’s existing health services were missing. It sees an opportunity to improve convenience and trust in preventive testing.
What is Amazon Medical and how does it work?
Amazon Medical is a diagnostics service integrated into the Amazon India app. It currently operates in six cities and offers over 800 tests with doorstep sample collection in under an hour. Most reports are delivered within six hours, and the entire experience is fully digital.
Which cities is Amazon Medical available in?
As of now, Amazon Medical is live in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi, Gurgaon, Noida, and Hyderabad. The service covers over 450 PIN codes across these cities.
Is Amazon building its own labs for diagnostics?
No. Amazon has partnered with Orange Health Labs, a Bengaluru-based diagnostics startup known for rapid sample collection and automated lab operations. This allows Amazon to scale quickly without building its own physical infrastructure.
Will Amazon offer cheaper test prices?
Not at the moment. Amazon has stated that it won’t compete on pricing. Instead, it’s entering the market at price parity, focusing on quality, reliability, and convenience to build trust.
What kinds of tests can I book through Amazon Medical?
Amazon Medical offers a wide range of tests, including blood tests, thyroid checks, liver function tests, full body health checkups, and more. It caters to both illness-driven and preventive diagnostic needs.
How fast are the sample pickups and report deliveries?
Sample pickups can happen in as little as 30–60 minutes, and routine reports are often delivered digitally within six hours. This speed is powered by Orange Health’s logistics system and automated labs.
How is Amazon different from other diagnostic labs like Dr. Lal PathLabs or Thyrocare?
While established labs have strong brand recall, Amazon brings in digital-first convenience, faster logistics, and integration with its larger healthcare ecosystem—connecting consultations, tests, and medicine orders into one seamless experience.
Why is preventive diagnostics a focus for Amazon?
Only about 12% of India’s diagnostics market comes from preventive care. Amazon sees this as a high-potential, under-served segment. By making routine testing more accessible and convenient, it hopes to build recurring usage and long-term health habits.
What’s Amazon’s long-term plan in Indian healthcare?
Amazon’s goal isn’t just to sell tests. It wants to become the default digital layer for health decisions—starting from symptoms to consultations to medicines. Diagnostics is its way of embedding into everyday healthcare journeys and building a sticky, full-stack ecosystem.
