A brief survey of the replies in this comment thread (beyond the dismissive comments) reveals that there are in fact several small scale and ongoing uses of delivery drones in a variety of urban and rural settings. It's obviously not a mass market yet but there are enough of those that you can't simply dismiss the technology as unworkable. Because clearly there are some minor successes here and there.
There are a few things where you could expect some progress to happen over time:
- FAA regulations are evolving and called out as an obstacle. But that's just the US of course. Keep an eye on countries like China which is in any case where a lot of the components are being developed. They are not waiting for FAA approval over there. And that's also the reason you can expect the FAA to be adapting over time.
- Cost is a big factor. The war time use of drones is a case where the use case justifies a higher cost as it means exposing less humans to enemy fire. Losses are high and yet it seems a highly successful niche use for drones even with the current state of the art in technology. Drones are being used successfully in places like the Ukraine, Yemen, and in other conflict zones. As cost comes down, that also opens up more civilian use cases.
- Battery tech is improving. CATL recently launched a 500wh/kg battery product intended for drone companies. Mass production of these is probably going to be a few years down the line. But the technology is shipping this year and not just some proof of concept kind of thing. For most current drones, that would be a doubling of battery capacity; which is a big deal of course. Bigger batteries are under development by a range of companies. Higher capacity, faster charging, lower cost, etc. batteries are coming to market.
- Several cities now have autonomous taxis. Both inside and outside the US. China especially seems very bullish and aggressive on this front. Mostly that's aimed at human transport but the extension to goods delivery seems like it's a logical next step. This stuff seems to be ramping up in more and more cities over the next decade or so.
- A lot of factories already deploy autonomous vehicles on factory floors. Particularly automotive companies have been investing in this. Mostly that's about delivering parts in the workplace.
- Companies like Tesla, Boston Dynamics, etc. have been developing autonomous robots that can move around and operate in more chaotic places. It seems like these could ultimately also get involved in delivery use cases.
So, the future is coming. It might not be in the form some people are expecting. Or happening at the (unrealistic) pace they seem to be expecting it. Hardware just isn't like software. It takes time to develop and it takes more time to ramp up manufacturing. And you don't do that before you have a market. The road from a handful to hundreds to thousands to hundreds of thousands units is just very long and not a straight line.
There is a lot of stuff happening right now. And we're past the point where you can dismiss a lot of this stuff as impossible because there are countless working proofs of concept and real world products challenging that notion already.