App delivery workers earn at least $22.13 an hour before tips

If you deliver food or groceries through an app in New York City, the app has to pay you at least $22.13 an hour for time spent preparing and making deliveries, not counting tips. Under the standard method, apps also must pay enough across their workforce to cover workers’ combined waiting time at that rate. Apps can’t use tips to meet the minimum. The rate goes up with inflation every April, and you don’t have to sign up for anything.

Before enforcement, restaurant-app delivery workers earned an average of just $5.05 an hour before tips, according to the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. The city says the rule increased delivery workers’ pay by more than $2 billion through June 2026.

The City Council set this in motion in 2021 with a law led by Council Member Brad Lander that required the city to study delivery workers’ pay and set a minimum; it became law without Mayor Bill de Blasio’s signature. DCWP adopted the rule in 2023, starting at $17.96 an hour, and the city defended it when delivery apps sued. Enforcement began after state courts ruled for the city.

In 2025 the Council passed laws extending the same minimum to grocery delivery apps, led by Council Member Sandy Nurse, and adding requirements for tipping options, faster payment, and itemized pay statements. Mayor Eric Adams vetoed two bills, including the grocery minimum; the Council overrode him on September 10, 2025, and the laws took effect in January 2026.