Vietnam’s e-commerce market hits US$8 billion in 2018

It was the highest growth rate in the past three years, compared with 23% and 24% in 2016 and 2017, respectively.

The white paper noted that e-commerce activities have made a notable contribution to Vietnam’s trade growth and overall economic growth.

In 2018, the number of Vietnamese consumers doing online shopping was 39.9 million, up 6.3% against the previous year, with an average consumer spending US$202, an increase of US$16 from 2017.

Revenues of business-to-consumer sales accounted for 4.2% of Vietnam’s total retail and service revenues in 2018, according to the paper.

More and more people are using mobile devices to place their orders, reaching 81% in 2018 while the ratio of using computers for online shopping dropped from 65% to 61%.

The main online purchases were clothes, footwear and cosmetics; books and stationery items; household appliances; tech and electronic gadgets; movie and music tickets; food; travel tickets; hotel and tour bookings.

E-commerce websites are the most popular channel for online shopping, followed by shopping apps on mobile devices and social media networks.

According to the report, the primary issue causing consumers to be reluctant to shop online is goods of lower quality than advertised, with poor customer service and personal information disclosure being the second and third biggest concerns.