How is checkout abandonment different from cart abandonment?

Cart abandonment can happen after a shopper adds an item but before checkout starts. Checkout abandonment happens after the shopper has entered the checkout flow, such as by beginning to provide shipping or payment information.

How do you calculate the checkout abandonment rate?

A common formula is: (initiated checkouts − completed purchases) ÷ initiated checkouts × 100. Use the same definition of “initiated checkout” and “completed purchase” across reporting periods, devices, and audiences so comparisons remain meaningful.

What causes checkout abandonment?

Common causes include unexpected shipping or tax costs, forced account creation, too many or confusing form fields, unclear delivery expectations, missing preferred payment methods, and technical or validation errors. The mix varies by business, audience, device, and market, so a benchmark alone cannot identify the cause on a specific site.

Is a high checkout abandonment rate always a UX problem?

No. Some shoppers are browsing, comparing prices, waiting for a decision, or unable to complete a purchase for reasons outside the checkout design. A high rate is a signal to investigate; it is not proof that one design change will solve the problem.

How can teams reduce checkout abandonment?

Start by making the total cost, delivery expectations, payment options, and return information clear at the right moment. Offer a straightforward guest path where appropriate, reduce unnecessary form effort, make validation messages understandable, and test the experience on the devices and browsers that matter most.

How can Contentsquare help analyze checkout abandonment?

Contentsquare can show where shoppers leave in a checkout funnel, what they did before leaving, how behavior differs across segments, and whether errors or confusing page elements are involved. These views help teams move from a rate to a more specific hypothesis about what to fix.

What is checkout abandonment?

Definition

Checkout abandonment is the point at which a potential customer has entered an ecommerce checkout flow and then exits without confirming an order. A checkout flow may include steps such as entering contact and delivery details, selecting shipping, reviewing the order, and choosing or submitting a payment method.

Teams usually measure it as a rate: the share of initiated checkouts that do not result in a completed purchase. The exact rate depends on how a business defines “checkout started” and “purchase completed,” so those events should be tracked consistently.

Checkout abandonment is narrower than cart abandonment. Cart abandonment can happen before checkout begins; checkout abandonment signals that the shopper got further into the purchase journey and encountered a barrier, changed their mind, or needed more time.

What does that mean

Imagine a shopper has already walked to the checkout counter, then leaves before paying. Checkout abandonment is the online version of that moment. It tells you that the shopper was relatively close to buying, but did not finish.

Why this matters

Understanding checkout abandonment helps teams separate product or pricing hesitation from problems in the purchase flow. Ecommerce and Marketing teams can protect revenue by reducing avoidable friction, while Product, UX/UI, and Data teams can use the signal to prioritize clearer forms, better error handling, and more reliable checkout experiences.

Use cases

Find the checkout step where shoppers drop off

Data and Ecommerce teams may see a high overall abandonment rate but not know whether shoppers leave at shipping, payment, order review, or the final submission. Looking only at the total hides which step deserves attention first.

A step-based checkout funnel breaks the journey into measurable stages and compares progression between them. The result is a focused improvement plan: teams can address the highest-impact step instead of redesigning the entire checkout flow at once.

Explain friction behind a checkout drop-off

Product and UX/UI teams need more than a percentage to understand why a shopper stopped. A drop-off can come from confusing content, an unresponsive control, a validation problem, a technical error, or a payment step that does not behave as expected.

Combining funnel data with heatmaps, session replays, and error evidence shows what happened before the exit. That context helps teams distinguish a design issue from a bug and make a fix that is more likely to improve completion without adding new friction.

Compare checkout performance across devices and audiences

Ecommerce and Marketing teams may find that abandonment is concentrated among mobile shoppers, a campaign audience, a browser, or a particular region. A blended rate can make these differences easy to miss.

Segmented funnel and behavior analysis reveals where the experience performs differently and whether the cause is device-specific, audience-specific, or common across the site. Teams can then tailor layouts, messaging, payment options, or technical fixes to the shoppers who need them most.

See it in practice

MediaMarkt used Journeys and Heatmaps to understand abandonment at several checkout steps, including a mobile drop-off at the final submission stage. The analysis helped the team identify friction, reduce checkout drop-offs, and increase checkout conversion.

How Contentsquare helps

Funnel Analysis maps checkout stages, shows where users drop off, and helps teams prioritize the steps with the greatest conversion impact.
Session Replay lets teams watch real checkout journeys to see hesitation, confusion, repeated actions, and the moments surrounding an exit.
Heatmaps shows how shoppers interact with checkout content and form elements, including where they click, scroll, or struggle to complete a form.
Error Analysis surfaces technical and functional errors, connects them to affected journeys, and helps teams focus on issues that hurt conversions.

FAQs on checkout abandonment

Checkout abandonment is when a shopper starts an online checkout but leaves before completing the purchase. It measures a later-stage exit than cart abandonment and is commonly used to assess the checkout experience.

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