So, Are People Actually Using Fashion Apps?

There's a seemingly endless stream of shopping apps constantly hitting the market, vying for our attention, credit card balances, and iPhone memory space. Frankly, it can be hard to keep tabs on all of them. Sometimes we wonder: Are people actually using all of these apps that keep cropping up? Yes, indeed, and many have more in rotation than you might expect, according to a new survey from Google and Ipsos, a market research firm. The survey found that 58% of respondents had used a shopping app in the previous month, with the majority of those app-perusing folks doing so on a weekly basis. And while we might expect those who even use shopping apps to download one, maybe two, at most, the number is markedly higher. The average is actually 4.2 shopping apps per smartphone user, according to the survey. And yes, most shopping-app fans are using them to spruce up their closets: 70% of the survey's respondents had bought clothing, shoes, or accessories on their phones in the previous month. (The following three most-used categories: electronics, skin care and cosmetics, and groceries, respectively.) But why are people hitting up the App Store for shopping purposes in the first place? Primarily (you guessed it) in pursuit of a great deal. The main motivation for 49% of respondents is to access discounts or special offers, per the survey, while 37% of folks said they will download a shopping app expressly to make a purchase. But the majority of shopping-app users don't want to pay for this convenience: Just a quarter of respondents have actually paid for a shopping app. Most online shopping is still occurring on actual computers, not phones. Currently in the U.S,, people spend 59% of their online shopping time on their mobile devices (versus on desktop computers), yet mobile shopping only accounts for 15% of sales, with 85% of sales taking place on desktop computers, per Business Insider. But by 2020, mobile shopping is predicted to account for 45% of all sales made beyond physical stores. The survey also looked at the primary motivators for "abandoning" a shopping app, and, turns out, it's basically the same reason for removing any kind of app: a lack of memory space. Basically, there's a whole lot more love for shopping apps out there than we'd expect. Does this reflect the state of your iPhone home screen?