According to an ecommercedb study conducted in 2023, Greece, Croatia, Italy, Portugal, and Serbia have the highest cart abandonment rate in Europe, at 10.4%. They are closely followed by the Czech Republic, Spain, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, each with 10.3%.
Compared to the European average, the cart abandonment rate has experienced fluctuations in recent years. In 2020, there was a decline to 7.3%, which dropped to 6.9% in 2021. However, in 2022 it increased to 7.7% and made a significant jump to 8.9% in 2023. And in 2024 it has shown a rise again to reach an average of 10% in Europe.
A study conducted by DHL looked at the main reasons for cart abandonment in the UK, France, Spain, Germany, Sweden, Poland, the Netherlands, Italy, Czech Republic and Austria.
The most common factor cited by respondents for cart abandonment is the high cost of delivery, mentioned by 50% of respondents as a determining factor. Another relevant aspect is the speed of delivery, with 27% of shoppers opting to abandon their purchases due to long delivery times. Likewise, the lack of preferred payment methods also influences 27% of cart abandonment decisions.
Also, slow website loading times, the requirement to create a user account before checkout, and preferred shopping times, especially during weekends when cart abandonment peaks, also play significant roles.
Interestingly, retargeting strategies such as offering discounts have been seen to encourage millennials to complete purchases of previously abandoned items. Data from DHL’s European Online Shopper Survey 2023 sheds light on the nuances behind these behaviors and offers valuable perspectives.
Following a Statista report, in 2022, shopping cart abandonment was most prevalent in the Caribbean, with over 92 percent of carts abandoned during online shopping. Second-ranked was Africa, where 85.15 percent of carts were abandoned instead of leading to a purchase.
