Compared to other European countries, the Netherlands has the highest share of online shoppers. In the last quarter of 2024, at least 86.7 percent of Dutch consumers bought something online. It means that hundreds of thousands started online shopping last year.
These data come from the latest report from Eurostat, the European Union’s statistics office. Earlier this year, it published a report comparing the percentage of online shoppers in Europe between 2014 and 2024. In that report, Ireland had the highest share (96 percent). In that report, Eurostat focused only on internet users who shopped online in the last 12 months.
In the new dataset, the statistics office includes ‘all individuals’, between 16 and 75 years old, in the listed countries that shopped online in the last quarter of 2024. Because of this difference, the results of the report are now different as well.
European average of online shoppers is 60.2%
In the last quarter of 2024, 86.7 percent of Dutch consumers shopped online. Ireland followed in a close second place, with 85.9 percent. In third place is Denmark (81.8 percent), followed by Norway (80.5 percent). The average of all member states of the European Union is 60.2 percent.
Italy, Romania and Bulgaria are at the bottom of the list of member states of the European Union
Italy, Romania and Bulgaria are at the bottom of the list in terms of member states of the European Union, although the amount of online shoppers is increasing rapidly in these countries. The same is true for non-EU countries Montenegro and Albania, which were also included, and where ecommerce is even less established.
More Dutch online shoppers over the age of 65
According to Eurostat’s data, the share of online shoppers in the Netherlands increased rapidly in just one year. In the last quarter of 2023, the share of online shoppers was still 84.2 percent. This means that it increased 2.5 percentage points (to 86.7 percent). In other words, over three hundred thousand consumers started shopping online in 2024.
This is mostly because of the increase of elderly online shoppers, as previously published figures from Statistics Netherlands showed. In 2023, only 64 percent of the growing group of Dutch people between the ages of 65 and 75 bought online, last year that already increased to 73 percent.
