DoorDash and Uber Sue New York City Over Tipping Laws

DoorDash and Uber are suing New York City in federal court to overturn two 2025 local laws that force delivery apps to display a tipping prompt at checkout and suggest a minimum tip of 10%. The companies say the mandate is compelled speech that violates the First Amendment. So far it isn’t working: a federal judge refused to block the laws before they took effect on January 26, 2026, and the Second Circuit refused to pause them on appeal. The case is still pending in the Southern District of New York.

What the New York City Laws Require

Two measures are at the center of the dispute. Local Law 108 requires third-party food and grocery delivery services to give customers the chance to tip delivery workers before or at the time an order is placed, rather than after delivery. Local Law 107 goes further and requires the tipping interface to include at least one option of 10% of the purchase price, along with the ability to enter a custom amount.¹ Both took effect on January 26, 2026.

Why the City Passed Them

The laws respond to design changes the platforms made after New York City began enforcing a minimum pay rate for delivery workers in December 2023. UberEats removed the option to tip before checkout, and DoorDash limited pre-set tipping amounts, requiring users to manually enter larger tips.² According to the city’s Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, those interface changes cost delivery workers roughly $554 million in lost tips over a 15-month period through mid-2025.³ Mayor Zohran Mamdani has cited figures showing the average tip for a DoorDash or Uber delivery fell from $3.66 to $0.93 after the apps were redesigned.⁴

The city defends the laws as consumer-transparency and worker-protection measures: if the platforms removed the prompts, the city would put the choice back in front of customers.³

What DoorDash and Uber Are Arguing

DoorDash and Uber filed their joint complaint on December 11, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The case, DoorDash, Inc. v. The City of New York, was assigned case number 1:25-cv-10268 and drawn to U.S. District Judge George B. Daniels. DoorDash is represented by Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, and Uber by Hecker Fink LLP.⁵

The central claim is a First Amendment compelled-speech argument. The companies say the laws force them to solicit tips through a “conspicuous” prompt at checkout, advocate that customers should tip, and suggest that 10% is an appropriate minimum amount. They frame the mandate as the city “commandeering” their platforms to dictate the content, timing, and manner of their communications with customers on what they call a “controversial subject.”⁶

The complaint pairs that with three additional claims:

Retaliation. The companies say the City Council passed the tipping law specifically to punish them for moving tipping prompts to the post-checkout screen.
Regulatory taking. They argue the law interferes with their property rights by forcing them to use their interface in a way that diminishes its economic value.
Due process. They assert that vague terms like “conspicuous manner” invite arbitrary enforcement.⁶

DoorDash has also framed its opposition in economic terms, arguing the law “unfairly pressures consumers” and makes delivery more expensive. The company says the cost of facilitating delivery in New York City is 95% higher than the national average and that dashers already earn approximately $30 per hour before tips.⁷

How the Courts Have Ruled So Far

Preliminary Injunction Denied

On January 23, 2026, Judge Daniels issued a 13-page ruling denying the companies’ request for a preliminary injunction to block the laws before they took effect.³ He found that DoorDash and Uber failed to show a “clear likelihood” that the laws violated the First, Fifth, or Fourteenth Amendment.⁸

Judge Daniels was particularly unpersuaded by the argument that the laws would cause “tipping fatigue” and damage the companies’ goodwill. He pointed out that both DoorDash and Uber already display tipping prompts that comply with the law for orders placed outside New York City and for “self-delivery” orders fulfilled by merchants, which undercuts the claim that compliance would be uniquely harmful.³ With the injunction denied, the laws took effect on January 26 as scheduled.⁹

Second Circuit Refuses to Pause the Laws

DoorDash and Uber appealed and asked the Second Circuit Court of Appeals to pause enforcement while the appeal proceeded. On April 22, 2026, the Second Circuit denied that request, finding the companies “failed to show that an injunction is warranted.”¹⁰

April Hearing on the Merits

At an April 2026 hearing, Judge Daniels pressed the companies to explain how the tipping laws impair free speech. Reporting from the hearing indicates the judge expressed skepticism toward the broader First Amendment challenge but signaled reservations about the specific provision requiring platforms to suggest a 10% tip.¹¹ The city filed a motion to dismiss in March 2026 arguing that the tipping laws do not violate the companies’ First Amendment rights.¹⁰ A ruling on that motion had not been issued at the time of reporting.

Where the Case Stands

As of mid-2026, the tipping laws are in effect and being enforced. The DoorDash and Uber federal challenge remains active at the district court level, with the most recent docket activity in May 2026, and the case awaits a ruling on the city’s motion to dismiss.¹² Judge Daniels has noted that the companies “could still theoretically prevail at trial.”³ The Second Circuit has not yet ruled on the merits of the appeal.

On the enforcement side, the Mamdani administration sent warning letters to 60 app companies ahead of the January 26 effective date, and the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection continues to monitor compliance across those platforms.¹³

A Separate Instacart Case Covers Different Ground

Instacart’s parent company, Maplebear Inc., filed its own lawsuit in the same court, but it does not challenge the tipping laws on First Amendment grounds. Instacart is challenging Local Laws 123 and 124, which extended the city’s minimum pay rate to grocery delivery workers, and argues the laws are preempted by federal and state law and violate the dormant commerce clause.⁵ U.S. District Judge John Koeltl denied Instacart’s challenge in a 35-page order on January 23, 2026, and in May 2026 the Second Circuit denied Instacart’s request to pause the laws during appeal.¹⁴ A ruling in that case does not bind the DoorDash and Uber tipping-law case, though both proceed before the same court.

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