A guide to South Korean e-commerce and alternative payments

Discover the favourite local payment methods for the affluent, highly connected South Korean e-commerce market

Countries South Korea

South Korea: an e-commerce & payments primer

South Korea is affluent, has an excellent infrastructure, the people are used to shopping online and the economy is performing well. Its economy has proved remarkably resilient during the most challenging of times.

South Korean consumers like to pay for e-commerce purchases using cards. But alternative and local payment methods also command a significant market share. South Koreans pay for 72% of online purchases with credit cards [1]. But 28% of all cards in circulation were issued by (from a Western perspective) non-standard providers [1]. 

Visa has a 40% share of the card market, Mastercard 28% and American Express just 4% [1]. The remainder of the South Korean payment market is split between E-wallets and bank transfers, on 17% and 5% respectively, a range of minor payment providers (4%), and cash (2%) [1].

South Korea’s e-commerce market

E-commerce accounts for 8% of all retail sales in South Korea [1]. 65% of all online purchases are completed on a mobile device [1]. Koreans primarily buy online because of the convenience of delivery.  Some stores such as Coupang offer a dawn delivery service – if you order before midnight, they will deliver at dawn the next day. And most stores offer at least a next day delivery if not same day [2].

Until recently there was no Amazon in South Korea.  Then, in the summer of 2021, the global e-commerce giant teamed up with Korean e-commerce site 11 Street to offer Korean consumers access to millions of items from Amazon’s stock list [3]. So far, however, the local market leader Coupang retains its leading position, with an almost 25% market share of Korean e-commerce [4].

Clothing (29%) is the most popular online shopping category, followed by food (16%), and electrical goods (16%) [1]. The average online shopper spends US$2,321 a year with cross-border and Korean e-commerce merchants [1]

Digital infrastructure, financial inclusion and logistics in South Korea 

As envious geeks and gamers the world over will tell you, South Korea has one of the fastest broadbands in the world, with urban dwellers enjoying speeds of 217Mbps [5]. South Korea also tops

the international rankings for mobile broadband, with speeds up to 190Mbps [6]. 97% of South Koreans have an Internet connection and 85% have a smartphone [1]. Connectivity will not be a limiting factor for merchants wishing to expand into the country.

Nor will financial inclusion be a problem. 95% of South Koreans are banked and 64% have a credit card [4]. South Korea is a world leader in digital transactions. Even before the pandemic, only around 20% of all retail purchases were made using cash [7].

The central bank has previously vowed to make the country cashless in the near future [8]. In 2020, despite having its hands full with the pandemic, the Bank of Korea pushed ahead with its programme to develop a central bank digital currency (CBDC) [9].

Merchants planning to operate in South Korea need to be plugged into the country’s digital-payments infrastructure. Recent years have seen a significant investment in parcel and logistics capacity, a sector which is growing at a rate of 10% a year and is forecast to continue doing so until at least 2027 [10]. South Korea is 25th, out of 160, in the World Bank Global Logistical Performance Index [11].

The South Korean economic and market outlook

Broadening out to a wider view of the country as an e-commerce market, economic growth looks assured, at least for the foreseeable future. The IMF predicts that GDP will expand at a rate of 2.5% in 2022, rising to 2.9% in 2023 [12]. The average South Korean earns US$32,390 a year, just US$1,807 less than the average EU citizen [13].

Despite the economic headwinds, unemployment was still at record-low levels as we were updating this entry. Retail spending was still growing throughout the first and second quarters of 2022, indicating robust demand even in the face of a complicated economic outlook [14].

Rates of digital and financial inclusion are high. As long as you understand local conditions and preferences in South Korea, there could hardly be a better e-commerce market in which to invest.

Footnotes:

  1. Original PPRO research
  2. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/16/coupang-crushed-amazon-to-become-south-koreas-biggest-online-retailer.html
  3. http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20210831000950
  4. https://amzadvisers.com/coupang-the-amazon-of-south-korea
  5. https://www.statista.com/statistics/896772/countries-fastest-average-fixed-broadband-internet-speeds
  6. https://www.statista.com/statistics/896768/countries-fastest-average-mobile-internet-speeds
  7. https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/card-not-cash-is-king-in-south-korea
  8. https://www.ft.com/content/bf5c929c-b78d-11e6-ba85-95d1533d9a62
  9. https://pulsenews.co.kr/view.php?sc=30800025&year=2020&no=1024936
  10. https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/south-korea-domestic-courier-express-and-parcel-market
  11. https://lpi.worldbank.org/international/global
  12. https://www.imf.org/en/Countries/KOR
  13. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNP.PCAP.CD?end=2020&locations=EU-KR-JP&start=2016
  14. https://tradingeconomics.com/south-korea/retail-sales-annual

Page index

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Quick facts

South Korea has the sixth largest e-commerce market in the world, worth 102.2 bn $US. It also has the 10th largest luxury e-commerce sector which grew to be worth 5.8 bn $US in 2022 and is forecast to reach 7 bn $US by 2024.

Despite consumer fears that a recession is imminent, experts believe household spending will continue to grow by 2.8% in 2022 and 2.6% in 2023 as South Korea recovers from the Pandemic.

Coupang, South Korea’s answer to Amazon, is ten times bigger than its nearest competitor, and yet only has a 15.7% market share.

The South Korean parliament recently passed a law to force Apple and Google to open up their app stores to payment methods other than Google Pay and Apple Pay. Apple has since done so but expects a 26% cut in return.

South Korea fact file

  • Population 51.8 m
  • Population 15 + 41.6 m
  • Online population 49.9 m
  • Area 100,210 km2
  • Currency KRW
  • GDP 1,631.0 bn $US
  • GDP per capita 34,721 $US

Payment types in South Korea

  • Card-based payments
  • Cash-based payments
  • Bank transfer
  • Wallets
  • Other
[{"label":"Card-based payments","value":"66"},{"label":"Cash-based payments","value":"1"},{"label":"Bank transfer","value":"6"},{"label":"Wallets","value":"22"},{"label":"Other","value":"5"}]

Banked population
  • South Korea 95%
  • Asia Pacific 76%
  • World 67%
Credit card penetration
  • South Korea 66%
  • Asia Pacific 29%
  • World 19%
Internet penetration
  • South Korea 96%
  • Asia Pacific 61%
  • World 62%
Smartphone penetration
  • South Korea 96%
  • Asia Pacific 62%
  • World 70%

The South Korean e-commerce Market

Top e-commerce segments

  1. Fashion: 27%
  2. Food & Personal Care: 23%
  3. Electronics & Media: 19%
  4. Toys, Hobby & DIY: 18%
  5. Furniture & Appliances: 14%

Cross-border e-commerce

  1. Cross-border proportion of total e-commerce – 4%
  2. Value of cross-border e-commerce – 3.7 bn $US

Top 3 cross-border shopping origin markets

  1. US: 49%
  2. China: 23%
  3. Japan: 9%
B2C e-commerce growth 2020->2021
  • South Korea 16.5%
E-commerce % of total retail
  • South Korea 25%
  • Asia Pacific 29%
  • World 20%
E-commerce completed on a mobile device
  • South Korea 66%
  • Asia Pacific 65%
  • World 53%

E-Commerce Trends

  • E-commerce market size 102.2 bn $US
  • E-commerce spending per capita 1,972 $US
  • E-commerce spending as % of GDP 5.9%

South Korean credit card market share breakdown

  • Visa
  • Mastercard
  • American Express
  • Local Schemes
  • Other
[{"label":"Visa","value":"40"},{"label":"Mastercard","value":"26"},{"label":"American Express","value":"5"},{"label":"Local Schemes","value":"7"},{"label":"Other","value":"22"}]

The information on our Insights pages has been compiled by us in cooperation with Datamatics and Wright & Brown. The data shown is partially owned by us and partially owned by GlobalData. © 2021 by PPRO Financial Ltd. No data and information can be used for any further publication without the explicit approval of PPRO.

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