A destacking conveyor and a method for destacking stacked articles, such as parcels and envelopes. The destacking conveyor comprises an inclined array of rollers that are arranged to rotate on axes perpendicular to a conveying direction. The conveyor is divided along its length into continuous roller-activation zones and selectively activated zones. In the continuous zones, the rollers always rotate in the conveying direction. In the selectively activated zones, the rollers are activated to rotate in the conveying direction and deactivated to be freely rotatable and allow articles to slide backward by gravity. The conveyor also includes a lift to change its inclination angle. By regulating the inclination angle and the activation and deactivation of the rollers in the selectively activated zones, piggy-backed articles slide off bottom articles.