Around seven in ten carts are abandoned, and the reasons are consistent enough across studies to be actionable. Almost none of them are about the design of the checkout itself.
Surprise costs at the last step
This is the largest single cause in every study we have seen, and it is entirely self-inflicted. Someone builds a basket expecting one total, reaches the final step, and finds shipping, handling or tax added on.
The problem is not the cost. It is the surprise, which reads as something being hidden from them. Show shipping on the product page, or state the free-shipping threshold in the basket, or put an estimator in the cart. Any of these beats revealing it at the end.
Forced account creation
Requiring an account before purchase is the second-largest cause and the easiest to remove. The customer is being asked to commit to a relationship before they have completed a transaction.
Offer guest checkout, then invite them to save their details after the order is placed, when it is a convenience rather than a toll. Conversion rises and you still get most of the accounts, just later.
Too many steps and too many fields
Every field is a chance to reconsider. Ask for what you need to take payment and dispatch the order, and nothing else. Company name, how they heard about you, a phone number you will never call — remove them, or mark them optional and mean it.
Address autofill is worth the effort: it removes several fields and it reduces failed deliveries from mistyped addresses, which costs you twice.
A slow or fragile checkout
Checkout is the most latency-sensitive page you own, and often the heaviest, because it accumulates payment scripts, fraud tools and analytics. Someone who has decided to buy and is watching a spinner is deciding again.
It also has to survive a dropped connection. If a payment attempt fails on a patchy mobile connection and the basket empties, that customer is gone. Preserve state and let them resume.
Not enough trust at the moment of payment
The card details step is where someone asks themselves who these people are. The reassurance has to be adjacent to that moment, not on a policy page: the returns terms in a line, a contact number, the payment methods shown, the padlock visible.
A first-time buyer on a store they have never used needs a reason to proceed. Give it to them on the page where the doubt occurs.
What to do about the ones who still leave
A recovery email an hour or so later, then one the next day, recovers a meaningful share. Keep it short and useful — the basket contents, a direct link back, an offer to answer a question.
Resist opening with a discount. You will train people to abandon, and you pay a margin for orders that were coming anyway. Ask what stopped them first; the answers usually point at the five problems above.
Keep Reading
Common Questions
Around seven in ten across most studies. The number varies by sector but the causes are consistent, and most of them are fixable in about a week of work.
Unexpected costs at the final step is the largest single cause, followed by forced account creation, too many form fields, a slow or fragile checkout, and not enough reassurance at the point of payment.
Not as the opening move. You train people to abandon and you pay margin on orders that were coming anyway. Ask what stopped them first, because the answer usually points at a fixable problem.
Got A Question About Your Own Site?
If "The Real Reasons People Abandon Your Checkout" raised a question about your own setup, send it over. We answer these properly whether or not it turns into work — and if this is not actually your bottleneck, we will say so.