Mobile commerce sales are projected to reach $3.56 trillion in 2021—22.3 percent more than the $2.91 trillion it registered in 2021. 

The growth of mobile commerce has been slowing over the past few years. But even though the mobile commerce growth rate over the past year has been slightly slower than the average year-on-year increase of 29.8 percent between 2016 and 2021, it is, nevertheless, impressive. 

This is especially impressive considering the fact that revenue from mobile commerce sales in 2021 has multiplied by more than 3.5 times what it was in 2016.

With the number of mobile users currently at 5.22 billion and growing, as far as trends go, there’s nothing to indicate that mobile commerce growth will stop anytime soon. 

Not only is the number of mobile users increasing, but the total time spent on mobile devices has also been on the rise. In the US alone, the amount of time spent on mobile devices every day by consumers has increased from 188 minutes in 2016 to 234 minutes in 2021. This marks a 24.5 percent increase in just five years.  

Incidentally, mobile commerce share figures have also been on an upward trend. The share of mobile ecommerce sales in total ecommerce sales has increased a whopping 39.1 percent from its 52.4 percent market share in 2016 to the current 72.9 percent market share. 

In other words, nearly three out of every four dollars spent on online purchases today is done so through a mobile device. 

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Factors Driving Mobile Commerce Growth

Mobile commerce growth can be attributed to the convenience of mobile shopping. The increase in mobile payment options is proving to be a huge boost for customers’ mobile experience. In fact, three out of four consumers say they carry out purchases on their mobile devices because it saves time. 

However, there’s always room for improvement. As many as 90 percent of shoppers say that their experiences with mobile commerce could be better. The two most common concerns hindering mobile shopping are pages and links that are too small to click on and security issues. At least half of shoppers also indicate that they would like online retailers to provide more product reviews and information.

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