Poll finds UK to be global leader in online shopping

Friday, April 19, 2013 - 11:45 by Graham Miller

A new study published by Experian, has charted the way that web users from across the world spend their time while they are online, revealing interesting facts about how habits vary between regions.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was found that British web users spend more of their time on the internet using safe shopping online services than anyone else.

Since 25 million people anonymously participated in the study, it is safe to say that the results are fairly comprehensive.

Last year, people with web access in the UK spent a tenth of their total time online browsing e-commerce sites.

This is one percentage point more than in the US and four more than in Australia, according to the Daily Mail.

Experian analysts pointed out that part of the reason for the UK's chart-topping position in terms of e-commerce usage last year, was the significant growth that the online retail market enjoyed in the run up to the festive period.

With Brits spending a cumulative total of 370 million hours carrying out safe shopping online in December, which is up by a quarter year on year, we saw off other developed nations where e-commerce is similarly well established.

The report found that although UK consumers do love to spend their time online looking at shopping sites, this is not the most popular activity overall.

That honour goes to social networking, which, if the average user's internet activities were broken down over an hour, would account for 13 minutes.

The UK lags slightly behind the US when it comes to social media usage, although both nations are closely aligned in most areas.

If you were in any doubt about just how popular online shopping is in the UK, this report contains some convincing evidence.