Powerful growth will define the future of Latin America’s e-commerce market: 22% growth in volume between 2023 and 2026 with a projected volume of more than US$700 billion, according to Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI), AMI sister company.
While there are more than 20 countries in Latin America, only a handful have developed strong e-commerce markets with significant amounts of transactions. The top 6 that AMI identified are:
- Brazil: E-commerce market worth US$216 billion in 2022
- Mexico: E-commerce market worth US$56 billion in 2022
- Colombia: E-commerce market worth US$33 billion in 2022
- Argentina: E-commerce market worth US$22 billion in 2022
- Chile: E-commerce market worth US$29 billion in 2022
- Peru: E-commerce market worth US$19 billion in 2022
Between 2023 and 2026, the e-commerce growth rates (CAGR) for these markets are projected to be:
- Brazil: 17 % growth in its e-commerce market by 2026
- Mexico: 33% growth in its e-commerce market by 2026
- Colombia: 27% growth in its e-commerce market by 2026
- Argentina: 22% growth in its e-commerce market by 2026
- Chile: 18% growth in its e-commerce market by 2026
- Peru: 35% growth in its e-commerce market by 2026
Defining E-Commerce in LatAm Markets
This is a key point, because often the definition of e-commerce in LatAm and other markets can be vague or restricted to specific merchant verticals or payment methods. For the purposes of PCMI’s analysis, e-commerce was defined as “all online purchases of goods and services, including all locally-issued payment methods, mobile and PC purchases, domestic and cross-border purchases and all products spanning retail, travel, digital goods and other services. ‘Online’ is defined as processed through a merchant’s online checkout.“
PCMI analysis includes purchases of goods and services processed through a
merchant’s online checkout, including:
- Mobile and PC purchases
- Domestic and cross-border purchases
- All locally-issued payment methods, including Pix, bank transfers and cash-based payment
methods - Spanning retail, travel, gaming, streaming, gig economy apps and other services
- One-time and recurring purchases
- B2C and B2B expenditure processed through a merchant’s website and its e-commerce payment provider
Excluded from this analysis were payments made by international visitors and B2B e-commerce done via wire transfer or paid invoice NOT captured in an e-commerce gateway.
In 2022 cross-border e-commerce accounted for 13% of total e-commerce purchases in Latin America
Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence
Other Key Datapoints
Beyond sheer volume and growth, PCMI’s analysis also look at different aspects of e-commerce in Latin America. Among its findings are that:
- Credit cards will be used for 48% of e-commerce purchases by 2023. However, their growth by 2026 will be lower than that of alternative payment methods.
- The forecasted CAGR through 2026 in Buy Now Pay Later will be 35%.
- AMI forecasted that Pix will reach $114 bn in sales by 2025. Pix forecasted CAGR thro
- Pix, the Brazilian Central Bank’s real-time payment network, has scaled astronomically and alone has claimed 16% of the entire region’s e-commerce volume in 2023, surpassing debit cards, which until now have been the #2 payment method.
- PCMI already sees mobile commerce leadership in Latin America, 71% share of sales by 2023, led by tokenization, card-on-file and instant A2A payments.
Going Further
Beyond growth projections, PCMI specializes in research and market intelligence for the LatAm e-commerce in a number of key areas:
- Identifying the major payment methods used in different Latin American e-commerce markets to help merchants with strategic planning, market entry and market expansion
- Helping merchants understand the cross-border e-commerce potential in different Latin American markets and the practices that can increase cross-border sales
- Using artificial intelligence and machine learning to help merchants analyze their customer data for a deeper understanding of e-commerce shopper behavior and tendencies so as to refine their marketing tactics, messaging and consumer outreach
Contact PCMI if your company has specific data, market research or market intelligence needs regarding the e-commerce market in Latin America or in specific markets such as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico and Peru.
