Why are people adding to cart but not buying?

The short answer

Most people who add to cart and don't buy are not rejecting your product. Some are just browsing. The rest usually leave because of something at checkout: a surprise cost, slow delivery, a forced account, too many form fields or not trusting the site with their card. Those are fixable.

How common is it?

Very. Baymard Institute averaged 50 different studies and found that about 70% of online shopping carts are abandoned (70.22%). Some of that is normal: in Baymard's own survey of US online shoppers, 42% had abandoned a cart because they were "just browsing" or not ready to buy.

The useful question is what drives the rest.

The top reasons people don't finish

Leaving out the "just browsing" group, Baymard asked US shoppers why they abandoned a checkout. The most common answers:

• Extra costs too high (shipping, tax, fees): 40%
• Delivery too slow: 20%
• Didn't trust the site with card details: 19%
• The site wanted them to create an account: 18%
• Checkout too long or complicated: 17%
• Website errors or crashes: 17%
• Returns policy not good enough: 13%
• Couldn't see the total cost up front: 12%

Notice what is missing: "I didn't like the product." Most of these people had already decided they wanted it.

How to find your own reasons

Industry averages tell you where to look. Your own data tells you what to fix.

Step 1: Buy from yourself. On your phone, as a first-time customer, buy something from your site. Count every surprise, every extra field and every moment you hesitate.

Step 2: Look at the drop-off by step. In your analytics, check how many people go from cart to checkout, from checkout to shipping, and from shipping to payment. The biggest drop is your first job.

Step 3: Watch a few real sessions. Session recordings show where people stall, scroll back up or rage-click.

Step 4: Ask the people who left. A one-question survey on exit or in a cart recovery email ("What stopped you today?") often gives the clearest answer.

Fixes that usually help

1. Show the full cost early. Put shipping costs, or a free-shipping threshold, on the product page and in the cart, not only at the last step.
2. Offer guest checkout. Let people create an account after they pay, not before.
3. Cut form fields. Baymard found the average US checkout shows 23 form elements by default, while 12 to 14 is achievable for most sites. Remove anything you don't need to ship the order.
4. Show trust where the card goes in. Clear returns policy, recognisable payment options, and a page that looks as finished as the rest of your site.
5. Be clear on delivery. A date ("arrives by Thursday") beats "3 to 5 working days".
6. Fix errors first. A checkout that crashes or rejects valid addresses loses people who were ready to pay. Test on different phones and browsers.
7. Follow up. A reminder email or message to people who left a cart, with the cart saved, recovers some of the sales that were simply interrupted.

Where to start

Pick the single biggest drop-off in your checkout, fix one thing, and measure for two weeks before changing the next. Small, tested changes add up.

And the "just browsing" group is not lost for good. Clear product pages, honest delivery dates and a cart that is still there when they come back all make the next visit easier to finish.

If you want a second pair of eyes on it, that's what turning more visitors into customers is about.

Source

• Baymard Institute, Cart Abandonment Rate Statistics (70.22% average across 50 studies; abandonment reasons from Baymard's US shopper survey; average checkout form elements).