

adults (32%) say they use a smartphone to buy things online at least on a weekly basis, while 21% say the same for desktop or laptop computers. About one-in-three Americans shop online with a smartphone at least weeklyīeyond whether or not Americans use certain devices for their shopping, the survey also asks how often these online shoppers take to their devices to do so.Ībout a third of U.S. While there are no statistical gender differences when it comes to making online purchases via a smartphone or tablet, men are more likely than women to report buying things on a computer (72% vs. There are more modest racial and ethnic differences in purchasing things by smartphone, while similar shares of these racial and ethnic groups report online shopping on a tablet. Asian (84%) or White (72%) adults are more likely to say they use a computer to buy things online than their Black (61%) or Hispanic (57%) counterparts. There are also some differences by race and ethnicity.

This is most pronounced when looking at computer use: 86% of adults with higher incomes say they use a computer to buy things online, compared with 74% of those with middle incomes and about half (51%) of those with lower incomes. Across all three types of devices the survey asks about, adults with upper incomes are more likely than middle- and lower-income adults to say they use each device to make online purchases. Online shopping habits also vary by household income. Experiences shopping on a desktop or laptop computer do not statistically differ across age groups. Still, those ages 30 and older are more likely than those 18 to 29 to say they ever use a tablet to purchase things online (30% vs. Around nine-in-ten Americans ages 18 to 49 (91%) say they ever buy things online using a smartphone, compared with 69% of adults 50 to 64 and 48% of those 65 and older.Īge gaps are modest when it comes to shopping on a tablet. Mobile phone shopping is especially common among adults under 50. Here are the questions, responses and methodology used for this analysis. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. It also included an oversample of 1,038 respondents from Ipsos’ KnowledgePanel. This included 4,996 respondents from the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. For this analysis, the Center surveyed 6,034 U.S. Pew Research Center conducted this study to better understand Americans’ experiences with online shopping, including with social media influencers and content creators.
