Smartphones Turn Every Store Aisle Into a Marketplace

Mobile commerce is no longer just about buying on a phone.

Consumers now use mobile devices for 53% of purchases, but according to new data from PYMNTS Intelligence and Visa Acceptance Solutions, the bigger shift is happening before checkout. The report, “Global Digital Shopping Index: The AI-Powered Shopper Has Arrived,” revealed the ways in which the smartphone has become an in-store force. Shoppers now use their phones to discover products, compare prices, read reviews, check inventory, access loyalty offers and pay in stores.

For retailers, that changes the competitive question. Winning on mobile is no longer about building a cleaner app or shortening checkout by one screen. It is about influencing the entire shopping journey before a rival appears in the next search result, marketplace listing or social feed.

The Smartphone Is Now Retail’s Operating System

Retailers still organize around stores, websites, apps, marketplaces and social commerce. Consumers move across all of them without distinction. That makes the smartphone less of a sales channel than a decision layer. It carries product information, payment credentials, loyalty rewards and competitive pricing across every stage of the purchase.

Mobile has also stripped physical stores of their old information advantage. The store is no longer a closed environment. It is one interface inside a much larger marketplace. An offer that works online but not in-store, inaccurate inventory or a loyalty benefit that disappears at checkout can quickly send the shopper elsewhere.

After all, the phone has trained shoppers to expect the transaction to happen at the moment of decision. A faster payment button cannot fix a weak product page or an out-of-stock item. Mobile optimization therefore has to start earlier. Retailers need accurate product data, credible reviews, consistent promotions and clear fulfillment options. Each interaction either keeps the shopper inside the retailer’s ecosystem or gives them a reason to leave.

Read the report: Global Digital Shopping Index: The AI-Powered Shopper Has Arrived

Consumers do not think in channels. They think in tasks: find the product, determine whether it is worth buying, obtain it conveniently and pay securely. The phone has become the device through which many of those tasks are organized, even when the final transaction happens elsewhere.

The smartphone did not replace the store, the desktop or the sales associate. It absorbed parts of all of them. Retailers now need to build around that reality. That means mobile strategy can no longer belong solely to the eCommerce team. It touches merchandising, marketing, store operations, loyalty, technology, fulfillment and payments.

The mobile shift may look like a front-end design challenge. It is really a back-end systems test. A seamless experience depends on connected inventory, unified customer identities, synchronized promotions, flexible fulfillment and payments that work across channels. Retailers that treat payments as an isolated final step may miss the larger opportunity. When integrated properly, payment can connect identity, loyalty and fulfillment, turning checkout into the moment when the entire customer relationship comes together.

That is why the 53% figure matters. It signals more than a change in where purchases happen. It shows that the phone is becoming the place where commerce is discovered, evaluated and authorized, even when the final transaction occurs somewhere else.