AI in E-commerce | SHOPLINE’s 2026 Hong Kong E-commerce Whitepaper Reveals Six Key Industry Insights

AI is now shaping every corner of business, especially retail and online shopping, as merchants increasingly integrate AI into their operations. In its newly released 2026 Hong Kong E-commerce Whitepaper, SHOPLINE highlights six major insights into the future of AI-powered e-commerce.

SHOPLINE today (16 April) released its Hong Kong eCommerce Whitepaper 2026. The company reported that the total gross merchandise value (GMV) of SHOPLINE Hong Kong merchants recorded a slight year-on-year decline of 2.1% last year. Vincent Kan, General Manager of SHOPLINE Hong Kong, said the city’s retail sector is undergoing transformation. While overall GMV saw a mild drop, the average GMV per merchant still rose against the trend, and average order value (AOV) also increased. He noted that with the right combination of artificial intelligence and omnichannel retail strategies, the sector’s outlook remains highly promising.

Six key e-commerce insights

1. Average GMV per merchant rose 11% against the market trend, while AOV increased to HK$669.

2. Omnichannel retail, or OMO, continued to perform steadily. Nearly four in 10 merchants (38.5%) adopted the OMO model, and these merchants contributed 62.9% of total GMV. Their average GMV was 7.7 times higher than that of online-only stores. More merchants are expected to adopt OMO strategies that combine physical stores, online shops, social media and livestreaming.

3. The consumer electronics category delivered the strongest performance, recording annual GMV growth of over 40% (41.9%) and the highest AOV across all sectors at HK$1,261.

4. The share of cross-border merchants on SHOPLINE increased by 7%, while their GMV rose 11.3%, with Macau and the United States standing out as key growth markets.

5. Existing customers contributed a steadily rising 53.6% share of GMV, while the overall repurchase rate recorded positive growth for the third consecutive year, reaching 31.9%. Merchants using the Shopper App achieved an average GMV 11.7 times higher than those without the app, while AOV was also 22.7% higher.

6. Around 40% of SHOPLINE Hong Kong merchants are already using AI features. Their average GMV was more than 1.2 times higher than merchants not using AI, representing a 128.5% gap. Traffic referrals from major generative AI platforms now account for 2.5% of total referral traffic. In December 2025 alone, referral traffic from AI platforms surged 485% year on year.

SHOPLINE launches Hong Kong-exclusive AI applications

To respond to the AI trend, SHOPLINE has introduced a Hong Kong market-exclusive AI Widget, allowing brands and merchants to experience the efficiency gains of AI without the need for development resources or technical expertise.

Using simple natural-language prompts, merchants can ask the SHOPLINE AI Widget to read their backend structure and automatically generate code for personalised features or gamified UI elements, such as lucky wheels, scratch cards and pop-up lucky draws. Merchants can simply copy the generated code and paste it into the custom block section of the SHOPLINE backend to quickly launch promotional game campaigns.