28 Mind-Blowing E-commerce Statistics

If you loved our previous blog post on 100+ Mind-Blowing E-commerce Statistics in 2020, this post will help you stay ahead of the e-commerce game by presenting 28 new and powerful e-commerce statistics for 2021. These 28 stats are categorized in the following 5 themes:

• Global e-commerce industry statistics
• COVID-19 related statistics
• Consumer behavior statistics
• Mobile e-commerce (M-commerce) statistics
• Digital payment statistics

Let’s dive right in!

Global E-commerce Industry Stats

1. Global retail e-commerce sales reached 4.28 trillion USD in 2020 and are expected to grow to 5.4 trillion USD in 2022.

2. E-retail sales accounted for 18% of all retail sales worldwide in 2020, and this figure is projected to reach 21.8 % in 2024.

3. According to Grand View Research, the value of the global e-commerce market size exceeded 10 trillion USD in 2020 and is forecasted to become 27.15 trillion USD by 2027.

4. The fashion and apparel industry is the largest segment of B2C e-commerce. Its global size is expected to exceed 1 trillion USD by the end of 2025.

5. The latest Forbes data shows that in the year 2020, 55% of online shoppers made a cross-border purchase resulting in a 20% increase in cross-border e-commerce sales worldwide.

6. China and the US are the two largest e-commerce markets in the world. China ranks first, with annual e-commerce sales totaling 672 billion US dollars and accounting for 15.9% of all retail sales. The US ranks second, with annual e-commerce sales reaching 340 billion US dollars and accounting for roughly 7.5% of all retail sales.

COVID-19 Stats

7. The global COVID-19 pandemic sparked a wave of interest in online shopping amongst new demographics and in new verticals. In October 2019, the keyword “buy online” generated 18,100 monthly online searches worldwide. The search volume for this keyword reached 27,100 in May 2020.

8. According to the United Nations’ latest survey study, 52% of the consumers agree they shop online more since the pandemic began. Furthermore, 53% claim that they will continue with the online shopping habits they adopted after the pandemic.

9. The pandemic also created new e-commerce business opportunities. 50% of shoppers are buying products they've never bought online before, with the top 3 categories being groceries, household products, and kid toys/sports goods.

10. A recent Fujitsu study revealed that COVID-19 is accelerating digital transformations in the retail industry, with 79.1% of retailers planning to use digital marketing in 2021. In particular, AI-driven & behavior-based customer segmentation strategies are being prioritized by most marketers.

Consumer Behavior Stats

11. In 2021, over 2.14 billion people worldwide are expected to buy goods and services online, up from 1.66 billion global digital buyers in 2017.

12. The e-commerce industry is set to expand and evolve, as digital buyer penetration is projected to surpass 65.2% of internet users worldwide in 2021.

13. The United Nations’ recent study found that home delivery is the most favored delivery option amongst consumers globally when they shop online (85%).

14. Free delivery and discounts/coupons are the top two reasons consumers prefer to buy items online, according to the 2020 report by GlobalWebIndex.

15. Almost three-quarters (73%) of consumers use multiple channels during their shopping journey.

16. Do you know that nearly 90% of consumers conduct product research before making a purchase online? Clerk’s Content Recommendations feature makes it easy for customers to do product research without leaving your site while you increase the ROI of your content marketing efforts.

17. The average shopping cart abandonment rate globally is 70.47%. To help you tackle this issue, we've identified the 3 best ways to maximize cart recovery.

18. 50% of consumers are willing to pay more for a better, faster online shopping experience. Just like how we helped Naturally Baby Shower, Clerk's cutting-edge AI technology allows you to provide your customers a frictionless and hyper-personalized shopping experience.

Mobile E-commerce Stats

19. The number of mobile users - including both smartphones and tablets – is expected to exceed 7.1 billion by the end of this year.

20. Mobile is the future of online shopping. In 2020, 55.4% of consumers bought goods or services online via mobile devices.

21. The revenue of the global mobile commerce industry is expected to reach 3.56 trillion USD by 2021.

22. The estimated mobile as a share of total e-commerce is projected to reach 72.9% worldwide by the end of this year.

23. Europe and the US are expected to be the biggest players in m-commerce market revenue during the period of 2020-2024.

Digital Payment Stats

24. As the largest segment within FinTech, digital payments’ global transaction value reached 5,204 billion USD in 2020.

25. Digital and mobile wallets were already the most popular online payment method worldwide by 2019, making up 41.8% of global e-commerce transactions. The share is projected to reach 51.7% in 2024. Comparatively, credit cards are expected to decline to 20.8% in 2024.

26. The digital and mobile wallet was most popular in the Asia Pacific Region, where it accounted for approximately 60% of total e-commerce transactions in 2020.

27. Although over the years, China and the US have developed into the world's leading digital payments markets. Europe is set to witness the most impressive digital payments growth this year, with transaction value surging by 28.3% to 1.17 trillion USD.

28. The increasing popularity of buy now, pay later (BNPL) can't be neglected. BNPL is projected to reach 4.2% of total e-commerce transactions worldwide in 2024. Last year, 54% of Millennials and 50% of Gen Z in the UK reported using BNPL methods for online shopping.

As mentioned above, providing a great and seamless personalized shopping experience is the key to achieve e-commerce success in 2021. Being the world’s #1 rated e-commerce personalization platform, Clerk.io powers 2,500+ stores worldwide to automatically improve CX and grow sales. Get started by talking to one of our specialists today: