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Best Ecommerce Couriers in Italy

Tissquad··Updated October 21, 2026·9 min read

Choosing the right courier is one of the most impactful decisions for an ecommerce business in Italy. There is no single "best" carrier: each has strengths and weaknesses that make it optimal for specific situations. A brand shipping 50 orders per day to northern Italy has different needs than one handling 500 orders with nationwide distribution, 40% of which are cash on delivery.

This guide compares the eight most relevant couriers for ecommerce in Italy in 2026, analyzing territorial coverage, pricing, COD management, and delivery times. The goal is not to find the perfect courier but to understand how to combine multiple carriers into an efficient multi-carrier strategy.

BRT (Bartolini)

According to Italy's communications authority (AGCOM), BRT is the third-largest parcel operator in Italy, after Amazon and the group of Poste Italiane, Italy's postal service. It has over 200 branches and serves the whole country.

Strengths

  • Extensive coverage: BRT says it reaches every Italian municipality, with over 200 branches and more than 12,400 BRT-fermopoint locations
  • Cash on delivery: among BRT's services, with remittance times to ask for in your quote
  • Pickup point network: BRT-fermopoint with more than 12,400 pickup points across Italy

Weaknesses

  • Delivery times to the South need checking: for ecommerce, BRT states 24/48-hour delivery in southern Italy and on the islands, but check actual transit times for your own postal codes

Best for

Ecommerce with medium-to-high volumes and customers across Italy, including the smallest towns.

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GLS Italy

In AGCOM's 2025 parcel market shares, GLS ranks after Amazon, Poste, BRT, DHL, and UPS, and in Italy, it lists 163 depots and 13 hubs.

Strengths

  • Pickup points: more than 11,700 GLS Points in Italy
  • FlexDeliveryService: the recipient gets a link by email or SMS and can choose a new delivery date or a pickup point
  • Returns management: among GLS's services, to include in your quote

Weaknesses

  • Add-on services: cash on delivery, Saturday delivery, and depot pickup are to be requested in your quote
  • Rates: at low volumes, compare the terms carefully, quote by quote

Best for

Brands focused on customer experience and merchants with significant return volumes.

SDA (Poste Italiane)

SDA, the express courier of Poste Italiane, relies on the postal network. The business parcel service (Poste Delivery Business) covers the whole country, with a few exceptions listed by Poste (Livigno-Trepalle and Campione d'Italia).

Strengths

  • Near-total coverage: through the Poste Italiane network, SDA reaches the whole country with very few exceptions, including rural and isolated areas
  • Pickup point network: more than 12,000 participating post offices and more than 19,000 Punto Poste points (tobacconists, supermarkets, and lockers) available for pickup
  • Cash on delivery: remittance within 5 business days of delivery, according to Poste's product sheet

Weaknesses

  • Delivery times: with the Standard service, longer than BRT and GLS (a guideline of up to 4 business days from pickup, according to Poste); with Express, a guideline of 1-2 business days
  • Surcharges: Poste applies them for Sicily, Calabria, and Sardinia and for hard-to-reach or peripheral locations

Best for

Shipments to rural areas, minor islands, and remote zones. Also as a second carrier for underserved areas.

Amazon Shipping

Amazon Shipping is Amazon's shipping service for sellers, on and off the marketplace, and it also delivers orders from the merchant's own website and other ecommerce channels.

Strengths

  • Speed: Amazon says it delivers within 24-48 hours across Italy, seven days a week, in the locations served by its network
  • Delivery attempts: up to three on subsequent days for deliveries on the Amazon Logistics network
  • Customer experience: SMS and email notifications, predicted delivery times, proof-of-delivery photos, and one-time passcodes; the recipient can set a preferred delivery location and reschedule
  • Weekend delivery: pickups and deliveries seven days a week, with no extra charge for weekends

Weaknesses

  • COD: cash on delivery does not appear among Amazon Shipping's services (FAQ and service charter, October 2026). A different courier is needed for COD orders, unless Amazon confirms otherwise
  • Requirements: service tiers start at 40 parcels a day (Amazon says it is still working to meet the needs of smaller shippers), parcels up to 15 kg and 70x50x50 cm, scheduled pickup from your site
  • Indirect access: a merchant shipping only a few parcels a day can use it through the logistics provider that handles its shipments, if that provider offers it
  • Pricing: rates depend on the delivery address and the parcel size, and get cheaper as volumes grow, according to Amazon

Best for

Prepaid orders where delivery speed is the priority. Paired with a COD carrier for cash-on-delivery orders. Ecommerce focused on customer experience.

DHL Express

DHL Express is DHL's express service, for domestic and international shipments.

Strengths

  • Market position: according to AGCOM, DHL is the fourth-largest parcel operator in Italy, after Amazon, Poste, and BRT
  • International delivery: express services for cross-border shipments

Weaknesses

  • Pricing: it is an express service, and from October 1 to December 31, 2026, it applies a peak season surcharge of €0.10 per kg on domestic express shipments. Our guide to Christmas shipping deadlines in Italy covers other carriers' surcharges and Christmas cutoffs
  • Cash on delivery: check with DHL before offering it

Best for

Brands with cross-border and urgent shipments, premium/luxury segment, merchants who want delivery with signature.

FedEx and UPS

FedEx and UPS complete the landscape of international couriers available in Italy, and both serve B2B and ecommerce.

FedEx

  • Services within Italy and abroad
  • Cash on delivery to check with the carrier
  • Italian-language customer service available

UPS

  • Network of UPS Access Points for pickup
  • UPS My Choice for recipient delivery management
  • Cash on delivery to check with the carrier

Best for

Brands that ship both within Italy and abroad and want a single carrier.

InPost

InPost runs a network of automated lockers in Italy. In September 2026 it installed its 6,000th locker there, and it now has more than 10,000 pickup points.

Strengths

  • 24/7 lockers: customers collect whenever they want, with no time constraints
  • Fewer failed deliveries: the parcel waits in the locker, so the "not at home" problem does not arise. Two risks remain, namely wrong contact details that keep the pickup code from reaching the customer, and slightly longer transit times at peak, as InPost itself notes for Christmas and Black Friday. Our guide to failed delivery attempts explains how to avoid both
  • User experience: app, locker opening with a QR code, and notifications to the customer

Weaknesses

  • Expanding coverage: InPost installed its 6,000th locker in Italy in September 2026 and reports more than 10,000 pickup points, but out-of-home pickup in general is less common in small towns and in southern Italy (Netcomm, the Italian ecommerce consortium, 2026)
  • COD: check with InPost before offering lockers for cash-on-delivery orders too
  • Size limits: standard parcels up to 41x38x64 cm and 25 kg

Best for

Ecommerce with urban customer base, prepaid orders of standard dimensions, brands looking to reduce failed deliveries.

The multi-carrier strategy: why and how

No single carrier can offer the optimal service for every shipment. The winning strategy is multi-carrier: assigning each order to the best carrier based on destination, payment type, weight, urgency, and cost.

How it works in practice

An intelligent management system analyzes each order and applies routing rules:

  • Prepaid order, urban North: Amazon Shipping (24-48h delivery)
  • COD order, Campania: GLS (cash on delivery among its services)
  • Prepaid order, inland Sardinia: SDA (post offices and Punto Poste points even in inland areas)
  • COD order, Lombardy: the carrier with cash on delivery and the best quote for your volumes
  • Customer selects locker: InPost (where available)

Technical requirements

Multi-carrier management requires a platform that:

  • Integrates with the APIs of all carriers used
  • Chooses the carrier for each order with clear rules (zone, weight, cost, cash on delivery)
  • Manages label generation for each carrier
  • Consolidates tracking from all carriers into a single dashboard
  • Handles COD reconciliation from multiple carriers

The numbers behind multi-carrier

We have not found a public, independent measurement of how much merchants save, or how much faster they deliver, by moving to several carriers: the result depends on zones, weights, contracts, and payment mix. The number that matters is yours. For a few weeks, compare average cost, average delivery time, and failed deliveries by carrier and by zone, before and after the change.

How Tissquad manages multi-carrier strategy

In Italy, Tissquad ships with GLS, BRT, Poste Italiane, and Amazon Shipping, and abroad with GLS, FedEx, DHL, and UPS, and chooses the carrier for each order based on weight, zone, and cost. We ship cash on delivery orders with carriers such as GLS and Poste Italiane, check the address before shipping, and, on request, confirm the order by phone, in Italian.

For you, this means a single point of contact for all your shipments, with no contract to manage with each carrier. You get access to the warehouse and shipping panel and, if you sell with cash on delivery, you receive a summary of collected payments with every payout. More on how we work on the shipping service page and the cash on delivery service page.

E-commerce logistics for Italian brands growing online

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Sources

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