Cart Abandonment: Why Shoppers Leave and How to Win Them Back

Cart abandonment is when a visitor adds a product to the cart in an online store but leaves without placing the order. According to the Baymard Institute, which has compiled 50 studies, 70.22% of carts are abandoned on average. In other words, of ten people who put something in the cart, roughly three buy.

Some of those people you won’t get back: they were just browsing. But a store loses a large share of them to things that can be fixed: unexpected shipping costs, forced registration, a long form, errors. Below: the reasons with numbers, what to do about them on your site, and how to win back those who have already left.

How to calculate your store’s cart abandonment rate

The formula is simple: 1 − (orders placed ÷ sessions in which a product was added to the cart). For example, in a month a product was added to the cart in 1,000 sessions and 260 orders were placed. The cart abandonment rate is 1 − 260 / 1,000 = 74%.

A few caveats so the number doesn’t mislead you:

• calculate phones and desktops separately: the difference between them is often bigger than between you and the market average;
• orders through “buy in one click” or by phone are purchases too; if you leave them out, your abandonment rate will be inflated;
• compare yourself with yourself over time, not with the 70% from studies: shoppers behave differently in a store selling expensive electronics and one selling cheap accessories.

Why carts are abandoned: the reasons with numbers

Baymard surveys US shoppers every year. 42% of them had abandoned a cart because they were “just browsing or not ready to buy”. That’s normal behaviour, and there’s nothing to do about it except send a reminder. Among the rest, the reasons are:

Shoppers could choose several reasons, so the total is over 100%. The data is from the US, but shoppers think the same way elsewhere. What differs is the detail, such as which carriers, delivery points and payment methods are popular in your market.

For comparison, Kyrylo Popov-Cherkasov, head of e-commerce at the Ukrainian electronics chain Foxtrot, also cites a figure of around 70% in a column for Retailers.ua and writes that an abandoned cart is a reason to talk to the customer, not a lost sale.

8 causes you can fix on your website

1. Unexpected shipping costs and fees

The most common reason. People see one price on the product page and another at the last step. What to do:

• show shipping costs and delivery times on the product page or in the cart already: “Standard delivery: $5.90, 2–3 business days”;
• if there’s a free shipping threshold, show in the cart how much is left to reach it;
• warn about any payment method fee before the customer chooses it.

2. Forced registration

People came to buy, not to create yet another account. Let them check out as a guest: email, name, delivery. You can offer an account after the purchase, when the details are already there and all that’s left is a password or signing in with Google.

3. A long checkout form

By Baymard’s count, 7–8 fields are enough for checkout, while the average store shows 23 form elements. Every unnecessary field is one more reason to put the purchase off. What helps:

• one name field instead of separate first, middle and last name fields, if the carrier doesn’t need them;
• address autocomplete, so people type a few letters and pick their address from the list;
• the right keyboard on mobile: numeric for phone, email layout for email;
• saving what’s been entered if the page is accidentally reloaded.

4. Inconvenient payment

Shoppers are used to several payment methods, and the absence of “theirs” is a reason to leave. A basic set for most stores:

• card payments online, including Apple Pay and Google Pay;
• PayPal, where your customers use it;
• for more expensive items, buy now, pay later options.

If a card is declined, show a clear message and suggest another method, not just “Payment error”.

5. A slow site and errors

17% of shoppers have abandoned a cart because of website errors. Worst of all is a failure at the payment step: the person doesn’t know whether they’ve been charged and won’t risk it again. Test checkout after every site update, especially on mobile. How to measure and improve speed is covered in our article on website loading speed.

6. Lack of trust in the store

People won’t hand card details to a site they see for the first time and have doubts about. Trust comes not from “Secure” badges next to the button, but from specifics:

• real contact details: phone, address, company name;
• customer reviews, including on independent platforms;
• payment through a well-known payment provider rather than an unfamiliar form;
• a tidy site without errors or broken pages.

7. Unclear returns policy

13% of shoppers were put off by the returns policy. Briefly explain in the cart how to return an item and who pays for it, with a link to the full terms. This is especially important for clothing, footwear and electronics.

8. The cart as a wish list

Some people add products to compare prices or save them for later. A separate “Save for later” or wish list button helps them, as does keeping the cart between visits. It doesn’t always reduce the abandonment rate, but it gives you a reason to remind them later, for example when the price drops.

Bonus: “Buy in one click”

For some shoppers even a short form is too much. A “Buy in one click” button on the product page asks only for a phone number, and a salesperson clarifies the rest by phone or messenger. It works well for simple products and for customers who don’t want to choose delivery themselves. But each such order is manual work for your team, so make sure these requests reach the CRM instantly and get an answer within minutes.

The cart on mobile: a separate check

Most online shoppers arrive on a phone, and that’s where checkout is most often awkward. Typical problems with mobile store versions:

• the “Checkout” button hides under the keyboard or at the bottom of a long page;
• subscription or chat pop-ups cover the form fields;
• a long list of delivery points opens as a huge dropdown with no search;
• after an error in one field, the whole form is cleared;
• Apple Pay and Google Pay appear on desktop but not in the mobile browser because of payment provider settings.

Simple things help: a button with the order total pinned to the bottom of the screen, large fields, hints under the field rather than in a pop-up, and testing checkout on several real phones rather than only in the browser’s emulator. More in our article on responsive design.

How to win back those who have already left

Even a perfect checkout won’t eliminate abandoned carts. So the second tool is reminders.

A reminder sequence

You can only send reminders if the person left a contact and agreed to receive messages. A typical sequence:

1. After 1–2 hours: a simple reminder with a product photo and a button back to the cart. No discount.
2. The next day: answers to common doubts: delivery, returns, reviews of this product.
3. After 2–3 days: optionally, an offer: free shipping, a gift, pay in instalments.

The channel is whichever your customers use: email, SMS, WhatsApp, app push notifications. Email marketing platforms such as Klaviyo or Mailchimp offer ready-made abandoned cart flows that connect to your store.

Reminder examples

A reminder should sound like it’s from a person, not a robot, and answer the question that might have stopped the purchase.

First, after an hour (email or messenger): “Helen, the X sneakers in size 7 you picked are still waiting in your cart. We’ll deliver them tomorrow, and if the size isn’t right, we’ll exchange them for free. [Back to cart]”

Second, the next day: “Not sure about the size? Here’s the size chart and reviews from people who bought this model. If it’s easier, message us and we’ll help. [Open cart]”

Third, after 2–3 days: “The X sneakers are still in your cart. Free shipping on this order until Sunday. [Check out]”

Each one has the product photo and name, one button that goes straight to the cart with the items saved, and a way to unsubscribe.

Careful with discounts

If every reminder carries a discount, shoppers quickly learn: add to cart, leave, wait for the promo code. In the same column, Foxtrot’s head of e-commerce writes that blanket 5% discounts work poorly and teach customers to wait for promo codes. A personal offer based on what the person looked at works better.

Retargeting

With Google and Meta ads, you can show people the products they left in the cart. For that, your site needs e-commerce events and a product catalogue set up for advertising. Show these ads for a limited time, a few days rather than a month, or they become annoying.

A call from your team

For expensive products and B2B, a call or message from a salesperson works better than automated emails: people often abandon a cart because one question remained. For your team to see these carts, they need to reach the CRM; see our article on website CRM integration.

How to find exactly where you lose shoppers

The overall figure of “70% abandon their carts” says nothing about your store. You need to find the specific step.

1. Set up e-commerce events in Google Analytics 4: product view, add to cart, begin checkout, shipping selection, payment, purchase. A funnel exploration in the Explore section will show at which step the most people drop off.
2. Compare phone and desktop. If orders are placed much less often on phones, the problem is usually the form or payment on mobile.
3. Watch session recordings on the cart and checkout pages: where people stop, which fields they fill in twice, where errors occur.
4. Place an order yourself on a phone, like an ordinary customer: with a different city, a typo in the phone number, a declined card. Problems are often visible at this step already.
5. Ask those who abandoned the cart. One question in a reminder email, “What stopped you from placing the order?”, brings in plenty of answers.

A systematic check of a site with this kind of checklist is a UX audit. What it includes and how to do one yourself is covered in our article on the website UX audit.

What not to do

Some techniques give a short-term boost in orders but hurt the store:

• fake timers and “only 2 left” when that isn’t true: shoppers notice faster than you’d think and stop believing you;
• automatically added paid options (insurance, gift wrap, a subscription) that have to be found and removed;
• a discount pop-up every time someone tries to leave the page: it annoys people and, like discounts in emails, teaches them to wait for a promo code;
• reminders without consent or without a way to unsubscribe.

Where influencing a decision ends and manipulation begins is covered in our article on neuromarketing on websites.

Checkout checklist

• Shipping cost and delivery time are visible before checkout.
• You can buy without registering.
• The form has only the necessary fields, with address autocomplete.
• Card payment, Apple Pay and Google Pay are available, plus the methods popular in your market.
• The total including shipping is visible before confirmation.
• Returns terms are summarised in the cart and set out in full on a separate page.
• Checkout has been tested on a phone after the latest site update.
• Cart reminders and Google Analytics 4 events are set up.

Some items can be fixed in a day in your store settings, others only by changing the checkout templates. If you’re planning a new store or rebuilding an old one, put these requirements into the website specification from the start, and see what the budget is made of in our article on how much a website costs.