This graph shows the percentage of e-commerce in total retail sales in the United States in 2016, by merchandise line. During the survey period, 3 percent of clothing and clothing accessories store sales were generated through e-commerce. Overall, e-commerce accounted for 8 percent of total U.S. retail sales that year.
Due to high penetration rate of the internet in the United States, where in 2015 more than 87 percent of the population had access to the World Wide Web, the e-commerce market has also registered a grow in popularity. According to a recent U.S. Census Bureau report, e-commerce sales represented 7.2 percent of the total retail sales in the United States in 2015. Private consumers are however not the biggest beneficiaries of new technologies, but the United States manufacturing and wholesale sectors, where, in 2015, e-commerce accounted for 63.2 percent of the total number of manufacturing shipments and 24.8 percent of wholesale shipments were also a result of online transactions.
In a ranking of the leading e-retailers in North America, Amazon.com is the undisputable leader, having sold merchandise worth almost 80 billion U.S. dollars in 2016 in the North American market. Amazon is also number one in terms of number of monthly visitors, having an average of 188 million visitors per month, more than double the amount scored by Walmart, with 87 million users. Some of the most popular e-commerce categories of products are music and videos, with electronic sales of CDs, DVDs and co. representing over 90 percent of total sales of such merchandise.
