The numbers are clear: Ecommerce is now mainstream for people of all ages. From books to clothing to groceries, shoppers can get almost anything delivered to their doors, often the same day they click the “order” button on a desktop computer or smartphone.

Ecommerce has leveled the playing field for brands with direct-to-consumer business models that can deliver a stellar online experience. But even born-in-an-omnichannel-world companies need to stay one step ahead of ecommerce trends to ensure they keep up with customer demands and don’t get lapped by nimbler competition.

The State of Ecommerce in 2025

Ecommerce continues its dramatic growth trajectory, with global B2B and B2C ecommerce projected to reach $37.05 trillion in 2025 and $41.34 trillion by 2026, according to the Department of Commerce’s International Trade Administration. This expansion is the result of both technological innovation and evolving consumer preferences. For example, artificial intelligence (AI) has transformed numerous ecommerce capabilities, enabling businesses to take personalization and customer engagement to new heights. Behind the scenes, operational processes across the entire ecommerce supply chain are becoming increasingly automated. Meanwhile, consumers continue to favor buying online, with mobile commerce, video content, and social shopping becoming dominant discovery and purchasing channels.

As competition intensifies, understanding and adapting to the latest ecommerce trends is essential for businesses that want to get—and stay—ahead.

22 Ecommerce Trends for Continued Growth

1. Increased Prevalence of Voice Search

Voice assistants on your phone, home smart hub, and even your TV remote control have come a long way. Voice search is growing in popularity, which directly influences search results and shopping outcomes. Ecommerce sellers must remain cognizant of changes in search so they can optimize for future sales. At minimum, make sure your ecommerce site is optimized for both mobile voice search by prioritizing highly sought-after information, such as website and physical address, contact number, and business hours.

2. AI-Assisted Upselling and Cross-Selling

AI and machine learning do a good job of predicting shopping habits based on browsing and shopping history. While no human brain could customize a website for every unique visitor, AI is up for the task. Some ERP and CRM systems include machine learning features to assist in cross-selling, upselling and guided selling.

3. Flexible Payment Options

Beyond accepting payment via cash or credit or debit card, modern checkout experiences now integrate multiple payment methods, including digital wallets—think: Venmo and Apple Pay—and cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin. Flexible financing approaches like buy now, pay later (BNPL), which splits payments for purchases into manageable installments with little to no interest rates, also nudge customers to click the Buy button. So do biometric authentication options, such as facial recognition, which ease the checkout process while adding security.

4. Augmented Reality to Visualize Purchases

Customers don’t want to guess what a new couch would look like in their living rooms. With augmented reality (AR), they won’t have to. Adding this technology means they can use a phone or laptop to see a live video of the room with the new addition. The same goes for artwork, flooring, and many clothing items. Ecommerce businesses should be actively adding AR where appropriate to encourage customers to virtually “try on” a product.

5. Smarter Mobile Shopping Tools

Brick-and-mortar retailers may not like seeing customers looking at their phone screens, as it often indicates price shopping or using the brick-and-mortar store as a showroom for a later online purchase somewhere else. These days, however, savvy retailers offer their own GPS-enabled mobile shopping experiences that help customers buy in-store or anywhere else. For all retailers, a mobile-optimized site and store are a foundational element of a positive ecommerce experience.

6. Growth in Subscription Models

When you sell a subscription, it’s a lot more likely the customer will return again and again. Subscription models have proven successful online, and many savvy businesses are finding new ways to turn products and services into subscriptions that keep customers loyal for months and years to come. Note that subscription success requires a long-term mindset and a close eye on unit economics, technology use, and the transition from “customer support” to “customer success.”

7. Continued Focus on Sustainability

“Renewable” and “sustainable” are not just buzzwords. Consumers and governments continue to support renewable energy, sustainable environmental practices, and long-term sustainable thinking. While investors once drove environmental, social, and governance (ESG) preferences in the stock market, recent trends show some pullback due to political, regulatory, and economic pressures. Nonetheless, consumer demand remains a key force, with many voting with their wallets to support companies whose values match their own.

8. Multichannel Customer Support

Past and prospective customers may want to contact your company for customer service. But how? Some prefer live chat or a phone call, others email, others social or text. Adding chatbot tools can lighten your customer service workload, improve the customer experience, and be part of a well-rounded customer experience.

9. Enhanced Distribution and Fulfillment Planning

Customers want purchases in their hands as quickly as possible. If your delivery estimates are too slow, they may go elsewhere. Multilayer distribution models, hyper-optimized supply chains, and software-assisted fulfillment are leading to big changes and big profits. They should continue to do so well into the foreseeable future.

10. Social Shopping Is Growing

Customers may not buy directly from your website. There are now many channels for ecommerce, including selling directly through social media. Popular apps like Instagram enable purchases without ever leaving the app. That makes social media a smart place for consumer companies to send their advertising dollars.

11. More Personalized Marketing and Products

Personalization means more than just saying “Hello, [firstname]!” to every customer that logs on to your website. Customers expect a seamless omnichannel experience, and that requires personalization. With machine learning, smart website features, and online tracking technologies, you can give every customer a highly customized and individualized experience. You may even be able to personalize products at a mass scale to further boost sales opportunities.

12. New Marketplaces and Faster Distribution Channels

Big marketplaces from retail giants like Amazon and Walmart are both a blessing and a curse for smaller ecommerce stores. They offer a new distribution channel to a broad audience, but they also make sellers captive to the added fees and costs of playing in another business’s arena. Ecommerce businesses must consider whether those marketplaces make sense for their products and consider ways to beat the big guys at their own game.

13. Highly Optimized Websites to Maximize Conversions

Modern web technology allows you to deploy two versions of a web page to see which performs better. A-B testing tells your marketing team what works best, so you can continually optimize every part of your website. Don’t underestimate the impact of changes in font, color, layout, size, and loading speed on your sales.

14. Growth of the Forward Deploy Fulfillment Center (FDFC)

Some grocery stores, malls, and other public places are now home to retail lockers where customers can pick up purchases. The “forward deploy fulfillment center” (FDFC) is a small fulfillment center—it could be simply a set of automated lockers already stocked with some common purchases. If someone wants to buy a new toothbrush or socks, for example, they may get a notification that the item is ready for pickup nearby as soon as they tap the buy button.

15. Additional Online Advertising Competition

Growth in ecommerce means more brands are advertising their online stores. As more businesses compete for eyeballs online, you may see more competition and higher online advertising inventory prices. Expect to pay more on popular keyword search terms and product listing ads for common items.

16. Instant Analytics and Machine Learning to Optimize Sales

Previously, analytics tools saw delays in collecting and aggregating data. Now many analytics and ecommerce platforms give you live results. You may see how customers are interacting with your website or online ads with real-time data. Combined with machine learning, you can use this data to understand where prospective sales are lost so you can minimize bounce rate and cart abandonment.

17. Preferences for Ethical and Independent Businesses

Recent events have struck chords with many consumers, and some shoppers actively seek to support—or avoid—businesses based on what they see as a positive or negative ethical stand. Whether a company seeks to actively pursue these shoppers depends on many factors, including its target customer, mission statement, and appetite for engagement.

18. Automated B2B Transactions

B2B is a big business segment. Ecommerce trends here will enable more automation, including automated accounts payable, accounts receivable, reordering, and fulfillment. If you serve other businesses, make sure you’re using the latest technology to solve their biggest pain points.

19. Changes to Consumer Privacy Preferences

Businesses must contend with an evolving patchwork of privacy laws that restrict how personal and nonpersonal data is collected and shared. They also impose stronger security practices and expand consumer rights and corporate responsibilities. It’s easy to accidentally land on the wrong side of these laws, so make sure your business is compliant. Telling customers what you do to keep their information private is a great way to build trust online.

20. Continued Growth of Direct-to-Consumer Businesses

Direct-to-consumer (D2C) businesses sell a wide range of products without using wholesalers or retailers as intermediaries. Shoes, glasses, toothbrushes, and razors are just a few examples of popular markets for direct-to-consumer sales. With new ecommerce preferences and tools, this will likely accelerate in the coming years.

21. Expanded Use of Video Content

Video is central to the ecommerce experience. AI is powering hyper-targeted content tailored to each customer’s browsing history and past purchase, as well as shoppable videos, where customers can click and purchase products directly within the content. Live-stream shopping events, which feature real-time demonstrations, Q&As, and flash sales, have also become popular. In addition, authentic, user-generated content that instills deeper trust with consumers has gained favor over professionally produced videos.

22. Increased Interest in Resale and Secondhand Ecommerce Markets

Everything old is new again. From clothing and high-end accessories to electronics and collectibles, platforms like Poshmark, ThredUp, and eBay are heeding consumers’ interest in purchasing preowned goods. These sites are of particular appeal to younger shoppers, who value sustainability and shared experiences. Established companies, including Lululemon and Gap, are also launching their own branded resale programs to support circular economy practices, which aim to reduce environmental waste.

Stay Ahead of the Curve With NetSuite SuiteCommerce

Keeping pace with an always-evolving ecommerce landscape requires a modern software suite that can adapt to changing consumer demands while maintaining operational efficiency. NetSuite SuiteCommerce provides the flexibility to implement many of the trends discussed above through its unified approach to ecommerce, inventory, customer data, and business operations.

By connecting a web store with inventory management, order processing, and customer data, SuiteCommerce enables businesses to deliver consistent, omnichannel experiences across all sales channels and devices. The cloud-based, multitenant platform supports flexible payment options, subscription models, multiple languages, and personalized shopping experiences. It also supplies the real-time visibility needed to make informed business decisions across both B2C and B2B operations. From drag-and-drop site management tools to built-in SEO capabilities and responsive design themes, SuiteCommerce helps businesses create engaging online stores that convert visitors into customers.

Businesses and consumers alike are embracing ecommerce across a myriad of product categories. Understanding the latest trends is a critical aspect of achieving ecommerce success, resulting in exceptional experiences that integrate social shopping, flexible payment options, video content, personalized interactions, and much more. Companies that align with consumers’ ever-evolving preferences will capture the greatest share of the ecommerce market’s continued growth.

Top
Ecommerce
Software

Free Product Tour

Ecommerce FAQs

What are the current trends in ecommerce?

An omnichannel strategy engages a variety of advanced technologies to bring multiple, siloed sales channels together into one, cohesive, and consistent experience across the brand. No company is ever “done” with omnichannel, though. Now, AI-powered personalization, video content integration, and flexible payment options will be key.

What is the future of ecommerce?

The multitrillion-dollar, global ecommerce market shows no sign of slowing down. Automation and machine learning will likely bring down costs while increasing sales for ecommerce businesses. Customer preferences are also shifting to ecommerce more rapidly than in the past.

Is ecommerce growing?

Yes, ecommerce is growing. According to the International Trade Commission, in 2024 worldwide B2B ecommerce sales grew 14.8% year over year. Worldwide B2C ecommerce sales grew 15.1% for the same period. All told, online spending in 2024 was approximately $32.27 trillion.

Is omnichannel a new ecommerce trend?

Omnichannel continues to be an important ecommerce trend. While it isn’t brand new, selling across multiple channels helps you reach new potential customers wherever they’re spending time online.