McDonald's and Meituan Launch China's First Dedicated Drone Delivery Route for a Restaurant Brand

en.Wedoany.com Reported - On September 10, China's first dedicated drone delivery route for a restaurant brand, jointly built by McDonald's and Meituan Drone, officially began operations at the West Bund in Xuhui, Shanghai. The route starts from the McDonald's restaurant on Longteng Avenue along the Xuhui Riverside and connects to a drone receiving point at the West Bund Skate Park. Users can order more than 30 McDonald's products through the Meituan platform, and under certain airworthy conditions, orders can be delivered in as little as about 10 minutes.

After a user places an order, McDonald's restaurant staff first deliver the meal to an intelligent transfer port set up outside the Longteng Avenue restaurant, where an automated robotic arm completes loading. The drone then transports the order along a designated route to the appointed receiving point at the West Bund Skate Park. This route can deliver items such as classic combo meals, snacks, beverages, McCafé drinks, and McFlurry desserts. The delivery drone has a maximum single-load capacity of approximately 2.4 kilograms.

Launched alongside McDonald's dedicated route is Meituan Drone's Shanghai West Bund low-altitude air network. The network currently covers areas including West Bund Dream Center, the Xuhui Riverside public open space, Mosu Space, and the McDonald's Longteng Avenue restaurant. Nearly 20 chain restaurant brands, including McDonald's, Ama Handmade, and M Stand, have already connected to the network, covering hundreds of products. Meituan plans to expand the number of deliverable brands to more than 40 within the year.

Meituan's current low-altitude delivery system uses the fourth-generation long-range winch drone M-Drone 4L Winch, the M-Port 3 intelligent transfer port, and the M-DaaS 3 drone cloud hub dispatch system. The M-Port 3 occupies approximately 1.4 square meters and is equipped with an automated robotic arm. The M-Drone 4L Winch can hover in the air and complete cargo delivery via winch lowering, and its operating environment covers temperatures from -20°C to 50°C as well as conditions including heavy rain, moderate snow, and Level 6 strong winds. The M-DaaS 3 can support beyond-visual-line-of-sight, multi-model, and high-density flight scheduling, and can make judgments on abnormal situations within 100 milliseconds.

Meituan began its drone delivery business in 2017. As of November 2025, it had deployed 65 routes in cities including Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing, and Guangzhou, with cumulative completed commercial orders exceeding 740,000. In May 2026, Meituan's "low-altitude air network" entered regular operations and began opening supporting drones, intelligent transfer ports, and dispatch systems to low-altitude logistics operators. After the launch of the Shanghai West Bund air network, restaurant brand stores, intelligent transfer ports, drone routes, and public space receiving points form a complete delivery chain.