Data Brief: Buy Buttons Cut 2-Min. Checkout Time in Half

Removing extra steps and legacy obstacles to speed conversions, the buy button packs a wallop for eCommerce operators — provided retailers don’t start adding frictions to what’s meant to be the penultimate frictionless checkout experience.

For the study “2022 Buy Button Report: Accelerating Checkout Optimization,” PYMNTS surveyed over 800 online retailers including major players, finding that roughly 80% are now using these quick checkout solutions, although 30% of retailers are still adding ID obstacles to the process.

“eTailers’ buy button adoption has gained the most ground since the 2018 Buy Button Index. Seventy-nine percent of all online merchants now offer buy button checkouts. PayPal retains a commanding lead over all competitors, but Apple Pay, Google Pay and Amazon Pay significantly expanded their buy button availability since our Q4 2020 report,” per the new data.

Get your copy: 2022 Buy Button Report: Accelerating Checkout Optimization

chart, average checkout time

The concept is and always has been a simple one: give browsing shoppers the ability to hit “buy” when they see something they want, drastically reducing friction and speeding conversion.

As the study states, “buy buttons significantly reduce checkout friction. Our data finds that eCommerce checkouts completed via a buy button are 46% faster than those that do not use this feature, shaving nearly a full minute from the checkout process on average. Buy buttons drop the average checkout time from 127 seconds to 68 seconds.”

chart, checkout speed

When it comes to who’s leading, PayPal holds a dominant position in the eCommerce buy button space seeing a 76% adoption rate among ecommerce sites. The study found that “Amazon Pay grew its footprint by 14% and comes in a distant second at 20% adoption. Fewer merchants offer Google Pay and Apple Pay, at 14% and 10% adoption, respectively, but both have surged in popularity since 2020. SRC lags well behind the rest and has seen adoption shrink noticeably since Q1 2020.”

chart, checkout time saved

Analyzing the time-saving performance of various buy buttons now available, PayPal’s ubiquity runs into Apple’s. According to the new study, Apple Pay is currently in the lead, “facilitating an average 46% faster checkout compared to regular methods. Google Pay, PayPal and Amazon Pay follow closely behind in significantly reducing the average time to check out, at 45%, 43% and 41%, respectively. Secure Remote Commerce (SRC), the buy button technology led by the four major card issuers, trails measurably behind the other buy buttons, though it still achieved a 26% decrease in time to check out.”

See the data: 2022 Buy Button Report: Accelerating Checkout Optimization