Online commerce grows when more people can shop digitally and when businesses can reach customers, accept payments, and deliver orders through workable online channels. The evidence below points to seven important conditions—not a universally ranked or experimentally proven list. It covers Japan, Canada, the Philippines, and the European Union, so the figures should not be read as a single global growth rate.
1. More people are participating, and retail is shifting online
Online commerce can expand as more consumers adopt it and as existing shoppers move some purchases from physical stores to digital channels. The available country-level figures show growth, but do not isolate what caused it.
Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) estimated business-to-consumer (B2C) ecommerce at 26.1 trillion yen in 2024, up 5.1% from 2023. Statistics Canada reported $73.7 billion in Canadian retail ecommerce sales in 2024, up 9.0%. For context, total Canadian retail operating revenue rose 3.0% that year; that is a different measure, not a like-for-like ecommerce growth rate. These are national results, not estimates for the world market. METI’s 2024 ecommerce survey results and Statistics Canada’s annual retail trade release provide the underlying figures.
2. Mobile access makes shopping available beyond the desktop
Smartphones put product discovery and purchasing within reach wherever a shopper has connectivity. In the Philippines, 66.6% of online buyers used smartphones in 2024, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA). This describes Philippine online buyers; it is not a global mobile-shopping rate.
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That same survey found that 36.7% of internet users aged 10 and above in the Philippines purchased goods or services online in 2024, compared with 23.7% in 2019. This adoption measure helps show a wider pool of potential online shoppers, but it is distinct from ecommerce sales value. The PSA’s 2024 National ICT Household Survey highlights report both indicators.
3. Social platforms help sellers reach shoppers
Social media can serve as a discovery and selling channel, especially for merchants who want to meet customers where they already browse. In the Philippines, 94.4% of online goods sellers used social media sites to sell in 2024, according to the PSA. The figure documents channel use; it does not establish how much social selling contributed to market growth or how effective it is compared with other channels.
4. Marketplaces and ecommerce apps lower the barriers to finding a storefront
Marketplaces and ecommerce apps give sellers access to existing digital venues for listing goods and reaching buyers, rather than requiring every business to build a standalone shopping destination. They also give shoppers a place to browse multiple sellers. The PSA’s Philippine survey reports use of ecommerce apps and websites, including regional observations in Cagayan Valley. Those observations show that these channels are present, but do not prove that marketplaces caused national ecommerce growth or support a head-to-head ranking of platforms.
For a merchant, the practical choice is whether to use a marketplace, a branded online storefront, or both. Marketplaces may offer an established place for discovery, while a standalone storefront gives the business more control over its own customer experience. The appropriate mix depends on the merchant’s market and operating needs; the cited survey does not compare specific providers.
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Online buyers need a way to pay that is available, understandable, and acceptable to them. In the Philippines, cash on delivery remained widely used, while sellers also reported mobile or electronic wallets in the PSA survey. This variety illustrates why payment options matter to the online transaction, but the survey does not show that any single method causes more purchases or builds trust on its own.
Merchants choosing payment services should consider the methods their customers can use, along with the costs and operational requirements of accepting them. The available evidence does not establish a provider or payment method as best across countries.
6. Convenient delivery is part of the online offer
Ordering online is useful only if the goods can reach the buyer through a workable fulfillment arrangement. In the Philippines, 69.4% of online buyers preferred delivery for receiving purchases in 2024, according to the PSA. That preference makes delivery an important part of the online shopping experience in this survey; it does not quantify delivery’s causal effect on ecommerce growth.
For sellers, shipping and fulfillment choices affect how orders move from checkout to the customer. A suitable approach depends on the destinations served and the merchant’s operations; the cited evidence does not compare shipping providers.
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Online commerce growth is not limited to individual consumers buying from domestic retailers. METI reported that Japan’s B2B ecommerce reached 514.4 trillion yen in 2024, up 10.6% year over year. It also reported cross-border purchases involving Japan, the United States, and China. B2B transactions and cross-border purchases extend ecommerce in different ways from domestic B2C retail, so they should not be combined into one consumer-shopping measure.
METI put Japan’s 2024 ecommerce ratios at 9.8% for B2C and 43.1% for B2B. These ratios refer to the respective market categories in the survey and are not shares of people who shop online. METI’s release reports the values and cross-border findings.
How to read the growth figures
Online-commerce statistics can describe different things: total sales value, the share of a market conducted online, the number of people who shop online, or the channels they use. These measures answer different questions and should not be treated as interchangeable. For example, Canada’s ecommerce sales growth is a revenue measure; the Philippine participation figures count people; and Japan’s B2C and B2B ecommerce ratios describe separate transaction categories.
Broader digital activity also provides context, but is not the same as ecommerce. The PSA estimated the Philippine digital economy at PHP 2.25 trillion at current prices in 2024, equal to 8.5% of GDP, and reported 7.6% growth from 2023. That is a digital-economy measure, not an ecommerce market-size estimate. Likewise, Eurostat reported that 53% of EU residents aged 65 to 74 shopped online in 2024—evidence that online shopping includes older consumers in the EU, not a measure of ecommerce sales growth. See the PSA digital economy release and Eurostat’s Digitalisation in Europe 2025 edition.
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