The COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted New Zealand’s food rescue sector, exposing vulnerabilities and spurring opportunities. Through 18 qualitative interviews and secondary data, this report explores the post-pandemic changes in the sector. First, the food rescue ecosystem has been significantly reshaped through the emergence of new actors and an increase in actors creating new dynamics in the sector. Second, with the shifts in funding post-pandemic, organisations have been exploring new ways of generating revenue but are also struggling with infrastructural and resource issues. Third, to meet community needs, food rescue organisations have cultivated capacities to innovate new practices. Fourth, the sector is showing clear signs of professionalisation including the standardisation and normalisation of practices, the creation of frameworks and the emergence of clearer boundaries around the field. And fifth, our interviewees are raising questions about the purpose and raison d’être of the sector. Those changes highlight three main challenges for the sector. First, the sector is facing a number of paradoxical tensions: collaborating vs competing, efficiency vs relational focus, standardising vs improvising, food insecurity vs food waste and acting locally vs nationally. Although those tensions are not all entirely new, they have become increasingly salient post-COVID. Another challenge is the need for organisations to adapt to the constant changes and build resilience. And the third challenge requires thinking beyond the sector to address the systemic issues of food waste and food insecurity. Recognising and addressing those challenges is necessary for the food rescue to continue to develop and adapt but also to remain societally relevant.