E-commerce trends in Belgium: what is changing in 2026?

E-commerce, or online commerce, is the buying and selling of products and services via the internet. In Belgium it is still growing, but foreign players are gaining ground, and TikTok Shop, AI and new European rules are changing how Belgians shop. As an agency that builds Shopify webshops for SMEs in Flanders, we at ClickForest set out the e-commerce trends of 2026, with the figures behind them and what you can do about them as a webshop.

Which e-commerce trends define 2026 in Belgium?

Belgian e-commerce is shifting on several fronts in 2026: buyers pay on mobile more and more often, foreign marketplaces and Chinese platforms are gaining ground, TikTok Shop turns social media into a shop, AI helps with purchases and packaging is becoming European regulation. The table pairs each trend with what to do about it now.

Trend	What it is	What to do with it now
Mobile-first	88% of online Bancontact payments happen on a mobile device	Test your mobile checkout and loading speed
TikTok Shop	Since 15 June 2026 webshops sell directly in the TikTok app	Calculate your margin after commission and test the Shopify connection
Foreign platforms	62% of Belgians have bought from a Chinese webshop; since 1 July 2026 an EU levy of 3 euros applies to goods in low-value parcels from outside the EU	Highlight your service, delivery time and returns
AI in purchasing	29% of Belgians sometimes let AI help them with a purchase	Make sure your product information is complete and citable
Local payment methods	Bancontact is the favourite payment method of Belgian consumers	Integrate Bancontact alongside cards and wallets
Sustainability	Since 12 August 2026 the first obligations of the EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) apply	Review your packaging and shipping materials
GEO alongside SEO	AI search engines like ChatGPT answer product questions	Make your content citable with structured data

How big is e-commerce in Belgium in 2026?

Belgians spent 18.3 billion euros online in 2025, 5.4% more than in 2024, according to Becom. The turnover of Belgian e-commerce companies grew more slowly, by 3.43%. Becom counted almost 64,000 webshops in mid-2024; data firm Tembi, which counts active webshops, arrived at around 20,500 in 2025.

Belgians also buy online more often than the average European: in 2024, 76% of Belgians made online purchases, against 72% in the EU. That year 28.8% of Belgian companies’ turnover came from electronic commerce (EU: 19.1%), and among small businesses 27.6% generate part of their turnover from online sales, more than in the Netherlands (23.7%), Germany (17.4%) and France (11.2%) (FPS Economy, 2024 and 2025 figures).

Greet Dekocker of Becom sums up why part of that spending passes Belgian webshops by:

“Consumers easily find their way to online marketplaces because a huge assortment comes together there.”

— Greet Dekocker, managing director of Becom, in VRT NWS (4 June 2026, translated from Dutch)

Where do Belgians buy online: at Belgian webshops, marketplaces or Chinese platforms?

Increasingly outside Belgium. Belgians’ online spending rose by 5.4% in 2025, the turnover of Belgian e-commerce companies by only 3.43% (Becom). Foreign players are gaining ground as a result: 62% of Belgians have bought from a Chinese webshop, 62% of them ran into problems and 73% want to buy there again.

Cross-border shopping is nothing new in Belgium: in 2023 Belgians spent 5.5 billion euros at foreign webshops, about a third of their online spending (Becom, 2023). What is newer is competition from further away, and Europe’s response to it. Since 1 July 2026 an EU levy of 3 euros applies to goods in low-value parcels from outside the EU (shipments under 150 euros), and at the end of May 2026 the European Commission fined Temu 200 million euros under the Digital Services Act for doing too little against illegal products. For anyone dropshipping with individual parcels from China, that EU levy comes on top of every order; the alternative is dropshipping with local stock.

“It is no secret that Chinese players such as Shein and Temu grow by 20 to 30 percent a year, despite their dubious reputation”

— Greet Dekocker, managing director of Becom, in VRT NWS (4 June 2026, translated from Dutch)

How important is mobile shopping in Belgium?

Mobile shopping is the norm in Belgium. More than half of Belgian e-commerce transactions happen on mobile devices, according to an estimate by the US trade.gov (March 2026), and 88% of online Bancontact payments already take place on a mobile device (Bancontact Company, March 2026). A webshop that loads slowly on a smartphone or has a cumbersome checkout therefore misses many buyers.

Bancontact recorded 526 million mobile payments in 2025, 11.6% more than a year earlier. So test your webshop on a smartphone first, from loading speed to a checkout with Bancontact; our guide to mobile optimisation goes into more detail.

Which e-commerce platform do Belgian webshops use?

Shopify and WooCommerce are the two big platforms. Data firm Tembi, which counts active webshops, found around half of the 20,500 active Belgian webshops on Shopify in June 2025. Store Leads, which counts all live webshops, arrived at 24,128 WooCommerce and 18,635 Shopify stores in September 2026. How you count and what you treat as active decides who comes out on top.

Shopify supports Bancontact through Shopify Payments and lets you set up a shop in several languages, two requirements for the Belgian market. ClickForest builds Shopify webshops for SMEs in Flanders and also guides the startup or migration of an existing webshop. Still in doubt? Our comparison of Shopify and other e-commerce platforms sets out the differences. Which apps you need is covered in our Shopify apps guide, and how to combine AI and automation in a separate guide.

Shopify CEO Tobias Lütke wrote in his letter at the 2015 IPO:

“We do not chase revenue as the primary driver of our business. Shopify has been about empowering merchants since it was founded, and we have always prioritized long-term value over short-term revenue opportunities.”

— Tobias Lütke, CEO Shopify, in his letter at the IPO (2015)

What does TikTok Shop change for Belgian webshops?

Since 15 June 2026, Belgian webshops can sell directly in the TikTok app. According to TikTok, Shop went live that day in eight additional EU countries, including the Netherlands. Buyers order through tagged products in videos and livestreams or through the Shop tab. TikTok announced a phased rollout of about three weeks. The channel mainly suits visual products with enough margin after 9% commission.

How to become a seller, what TikTok charges per order and whether the Shopify connection works is covered in our guide to TikTok Shop in Belgium. For selling live there is our guide on live shopping with Shopify, and how to use the channel more broadly is in our guide on TikTok marketing for Belgian SMEs.

Which SEO and marketing strategies work for Belgian webshops?

For Belgian webshops, a mix of e-commerce SEO, paid advertising and social commerce works, tuned to your audience and products. The multilingual market calls for a deliberate choice between Dutch, French or both. AI search tools such as ChatGPT are also becoming an extra channel: if you structure your product pages and categories well, your offer becomes readable for Google and for AI answers.

E-commerce SEO and local SEO form the foundation. The choice between Google Ads and Meta Ads depends on your audience and products, and Google Ads optimisation is evolving through AI, just as SEO is evolving towards GEO. Structured data helps search engines and AI tools understand your pages.

AI is also changing how Belgians shop. Almost 3 in 10 Belgians (29%) say AI sometimes helps them with a purchase (Becom, June 2026), although for now only 2 to 4% of consumers use AI as the first step in their search, depending on the product category. If you make sure your product information is complete and citable now, you are ready when that share grows.

How do you improve conversion and customer experience?

For Belgian webshops, conversion revolves around trust: Bancontact as a payment option, clear shipping and return terms and customer service in the buyer’s language. Customer experience pays off too: just over 8 in 10 online purchases are made at a webshop the buyer already knows, and 72% of online shoppers have 1 to 3 favourite webshops (Ipsos for Comeos, June 2025).

Conversion optimisation turns more visitors into customers. How dynamic product recommendations and AI-driven chatbots help with that is covered in our guide on CRO with AI and personalisation.

What role do sustainability and social commerce play?

Sustainability is moving from a choice to an obligation: since 12 August 2026 the first rules of the EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) apply, including to webshops. Social commerce is growing fast at the same time, worldwide towards around $2.1 trillion in 2026 (Mordor Intelligence). For Belgian webshops that means reviewing your packaging and treating social channels as sales channels.

In SafeShops’ first sustainability barometer (October 2021), Belgian webshops rated themselves 6.5 out of 10 on average: 86% bundled orders, 77% used sustainable or reduced packaging materials and 73% reduced packaging volume. According to Becom, the PPWR still lacks clarity on practical provisions such as the recyclability methodology and the harmonised label. How to prepare is covered in our sustainable e-commerce strategies.

Our social commerce strategies cover the platform-by-platform approach, with LinkedIn marketing for those who sell B2B; the rise of zero-click searches does make organic visibility harder.

How do you get started with e-commerce in Belgium?

Start with your products, your target audience and your margins, then choose a platform that handles Bancontact and multiple languages, and set up your webshop mobile-first. How long the startup takes and what it costs depends heavily on your range, integrations and ambition. In our guide what does a webshop cost we list every cost item.

For the build itself, follow a fixed step-by-step plan, like the one in our guide to setting up a Shopify webshop:

• Market analysis: a competitor analysis and an AI audit of your data and tools.
• Platform choice: a platform with Bancontact and multilingual support, such as Shopify.
• Technical foundations: SEO basics, fast loading times and a mobile checkout.
• Content and marketing: product copy in your customer’s language, local SEO and a first campaign.
• Training: teach your team to work with AI tools.

Ready to grow in the Belgian e-commerce market? ClickForest builds Shopify webshops for SMEs in Flanders and helps you further with AI implementation and performance marketing. See our approach to a Shopify webshop in Flanders or book a conversation.