The average cart abandonment rate is 70%. That means seven out of ten people who add a product to their cart never complete the purchase. While some abandonment is inevitable — people comparison shop, get distracted, or change their mind — a significant portion is caused by poor checkout design. Every unnecessary form field, confusing step, or unexpected cost pushes revenue out the door. Here is how to design a checkout that converts.
Guest Checkout Is Non-Negotiable
Forcing account creation before purchase is the single biggest checkout friction point. Research from the Baymard Institute found that 26% of users abandon checkout specifically because a site wants them to create an account. Always offer guest checkout. You can invite customers to create an account after purchase when the barrier is lower — they have already committed their information, so account creation becomes a one-click action with a password.
If you must incentivise account creation, do it through value rather than force — offer order tracking, loyalty points, or faster future checkout as reasons to create an account, not as prerequisites for buying.
Form Design and Data Collection
- Minimise fields: Only ask for information you absolutely need. Remove the second address line unless expanded by the user. Combine first and last name into a single field if possible. Use auto-detection for city and state based on postal code.
- Use proper input types: Set tel for phone numbers, email for email addresses, and numeric for card numbers. This triggers the correct mobile keyboard and reduces input errors.
- Inline validation: Validate fields as the user completes them, not after they submit the form. Show errors next to the relevant field with clear, actionable messages — "Please enter a valid email address" not "Error in field 3."
- Address autocomplete: Integrate Google Places or a similar API to autocomplete addresses. This reduces errors and speeds up the process significantly, especially on mobile devices.
Payment Experience
Offer multiple payment methods. European shoppers expect card payments, but also increasingly use digital wallets (Apple Pay, Google Pay), bank transfers, and buy-now-pay-later services (Klarna, Scalapay). Display all available payment options visually using recognisable logos. For card payments, use Stripe Elements or similar embedded payment forms that handle PCI compliance and SCA (Strong Customer Authentication) requirements automatically.
Display security signals near the payment section — SSL lock icons, security badges, and reassuring copy about encryption. These elements reduce anxiety at the most sensitive moment of the transaction.
Transparency on Costs
Unexpected costs at checkout are the number one reason for cart abandonment. Show shipping costs as early as possible — ideally on the product page or cart page, before the customer enters checkout. Display tax clearly (EU regulations require prices to include VAT for consumer sales). If you offer free shipping above a threshold, show progress toward that threshold in the cart. No surprises at the final step.
Mobile Checkout Optimisation
Mobile checkout conversion rates are typically 50% lower than desktop. Close this gap with touch-friendly buttons and form fields, digital wallet express checkout options (Apple Pay completes a purchase in two taps), a persistent order summary that the user can expand or collapse, and a progress indicator showing where they are in the checkout flow. Test checkout on actual mobile devices — simulators do not capture the frustration of trying to fill in a form with your thumbs. At Born Digital, we obsess over checkout design because it is where revenue is won or lost, and small improvements create measurable impact for our eCommerce clients across Malta and Europe.