It is based in New York City and was founded in August 2013[2] by Chieh Huang, Jared Yaman, Christopher Cheung,[3] and William Fong.

[2] With their background in mobile gaming, the team created an app for iPhone and Android, and several months later, launched the Boxed website at Boxed.com.

[9] In January 2017, the Today Show profiled Boxed as the wholesale shopping app for millennials, and highlighted the company's benefits,[10] and in 2018, Business Insider compared it to Costco.

[14] In August 2019, Boxed announced a partnership with New York-based retailer, Century 21 to create a line of beauty and clothing items.

It was the first time that Boxed had been offering those items to customers through its service, although the partnership ended due to Century 21 filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on September 10, 2020.

In August 2017, Boxed launched SMART Stock up, a feature that applies machine learning on customer data to predict when they will most likely run low on a particular product.

[18] In tandem with SMART Stock up, Boxed launched Concierge, an autonomous shopping concept that uses the same machine learning to not only predict when a user is running low, but pre-emptively fulfill and send a customer's product to them without them needing to engage at all.

[19] In June 2015, Boxed launched their premium private brand Prince & Spring, focusing on high quality products and design.

Boxed reduced the per unit price to match the male equivalent on items such as razors, deodorant, and body wash, paying the margin.