Ecommerce is booming for budding business-to-business (B2B) brands. The global B2B ecommerce market is projected to reach $36 trillion by 2026, growing at a 14.5% CAGR, according to the International Trade Administration.
It’s not just direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands extending their sales channels that are driving the shift online. Even legacy industrial buyers are leaning in.
But there’s a significant gap between buyers’ expectations and what sellers offer. In the B2B report we commissioned with B2B Online and Deloitte Digital, just 20% of B2B sellers said they feel prepared for the future.
Given this opportunity for B2B digital transformation, it’s important to remain on buyers’ radars and prepare your brand for a successful B2B venture. The 2026 B2B trends in this article will help you to stay on top and earn more sales in the coming months.
The sales growth opportunity of ecommerce may now outweigh potential costs for B2B businesses, and we’re seeing meaningful movement that reflects this: The number of B2B decision-makers willing to spend as much as $10 million or more on an ecommerce transaction has increased by 83%.
This trend holds particularly true in China, India, and the United States, as well as within global energy and materials (GEM), telecommunications, media and technology, and advanced industries sectors.
Official government projections show B2B ecommerce is set to reach $36 trillion by 2026, with a 14.5% CAGR. Heavy industries such as advanced manufacturing, healthcare, and energy drive the lion’s share of B2B ecommerce sales, significantly outpacing traditional sales channels for wholesale and retail brands.
Ecommerce as a whole has officially entered slow-growth mode—but global online B2B sales have not followed the same trend. According to estimates, 80% of B2B sales will be generated digitally by the end of 2025. By contrast, the share in 2019 was 13%.
The share of B2B organizations’ revenue from digital channels has also increased, estimated to reach 56% in 2025, up from 32% in 2020. One in five B2B companies plan to invest in ecommerce over the following year, according to a recent survey.
Global markets have picked up steam in the B2B ecommerce realm too:
What’s driving the influx of B2B online sales when economic uncertainty plagues purchasing decisions for individual consumers? Here are some culprits:
Whether it’s with their finances, politics, work, or just life in general, the millennials who drive B2B buying decisions value independence—and that’s a key reason why B2B buyers expect to self-serve their experiences.
Gartner found 61% of B2B buyers now prefer a rep-free buying experience, fundamentally changing how businesses must approach digital commerce strategies. It’s why over 90% of B2B companies have shifted to a virtual sales model since the new decade.
That sounds nice in theory, but what does it look like in practice? Here are a few examples:
Aside from providing B2B buyers with the experiences they demand, self-serve significantly frees up resources. Take it from Snyder Performance Engineering, who migrated to Shopify B2B after manual ordering processes meant the team couldn’t keep up with demand. Since launch, they’ve reduced time spent on back-office administrative tasks by 25%, while simultaneously increasing average customer spend by 40%.
B2B buyers expect shopping experiences to be quick, convenient, and personalized. Yet brands struggle to offer personalized experiences, and an insufficient ecommerce toolstack may be to blame. In our report, just 47% of B2B leaders said their current sales platform is “very effective” at creating personalized and tailored buying experiences.
The use of analytics in crafting highly personalized customer interactions isn’t just an option—it’s a distinguishing feature of winning B2B firms across industries. Personalization is a key focus for B2B leaders who want to improve buying experiences. They’re using advanced strategies like predictive analytics to meet individual customer needs before they even realize they have them.
Solutions to that problem offer great returns. At the beginning of the year, almost three-quarters of executives rank AI and generative AI among their top three investment priorities for 2025, recognizing that B2B personalization can drive revenue increases.
Top-performing B2B companies are proactively mastering the art of hyperpersonalization. Unlike standard account-based marketing, hyperpersonalization tailors unique messages to individual decision-makers based on a variety of factors, like past interactions with your brand and predictive analytics software.
Leading B2B ecommerce platforms like Shopify are leading development in this area to make it easier for brands to deliver DTC-style experiences to B2B customers, including the ability to:
“One of the reasons we needed custom pricing for our wholesale customers was that many of them fall into different B2B categories; some have hard margins, and some we can control,” says Brylee Lonesborough, technical leader at fragrance brand WHO IS ELIJAH. “The custom catalog capabilities in B2B on Shopify meant we could set individual pricing categories and attach them to the various types of B2B customers we have so they get a more personalized experience.”
Much of the B2B marketplace evolution is due to the accelerated changes in buyer preferences. Only five years ago, there were 75 total B2B marketplaces. There are now over 750 industry marketplaces—and this figure continues to rise—it could tip 1,000 by 2026.
Unsurprisingly, Amazon Business has a strong presence in the industry. Amazon Business accounted for 2.4% of the marketplace’s total ecommerce sales. Per Digital Commerce, 6 in 10 B2B buyers do more than a quarter of their B2B buying on Amazon. And by 2025, Amazon Business is projected to surpass a gross merchandise volume of $83.1 billion.
Also consider the wholesale marketplace Faire. In 2022, around 600,000 independent retailers used the marketplace to sell to wholesale customers. Just one year later, that number jumped to 700,000—likely influenced by Faire’s partnership with Shopify. Some of the more notable partnerships include brands like YMI Jeans, Skinny Confidential, and Sugarfina.
As vertical B2B marketplaces gain popularity, they’re not just connecting buyers and sellers; they’re reshaping expectations around pricing. Buyers now want an array of options, from shipping to features—but above all, they want competitive pricing. Beyond simply building relationships, these buyers are seeking efficiency and the best value for their money.
Today’s B2B marketplaces can handle dynamic pricing with algorithms capable of adjusting pricing based on a mix of factors, including competition, supply and demand, and even time. From cost-plus pricing to value-based models, vendors now use diverse strategies to remain competitive and maximize their margins.
For instance, adjusting prices on slow-selling items can help clear out inventory, while timely discounts can boost demand for popular products. It’s not just about reacting to the market—it’s about proactively shaping buyer behavior.
Social commerce is typically seen as more of a B2C marketing and sales strategy, but B2B brands are increasingly getting in on the action. Trends indicate that the global social commerce market is set to reach $17.83 trillion by 2033.
B2B brands are discovering that their target audience already searches for products on social media platforms in various ways:
Choosing the right social media platform for your B2B offerings is the key to success. Consider which platforms are most relevant to your audience and which channel is best suited for engagement with your product.
To find out, create a variety of social media posts—including product demo videos or customer testimonials—and see what resonates most strongly with your target audience. When you’re ready to embrace social commerce tools, add your product catalogs to each platform to make it easier for potential customers to browse your available inventory.
Here’s a great example of a TikTok video posted by B2B retailer and Shopify merchant Ceramic Speed, who use the platform to educate prospective buyers on how their products work:
📚Learn more: How Ceramic Speed increased B2B sales order placement speeds by 5% with Shopify
Today’s buyers lean increasingly into digital technologies earlier in the sales process, which is why the research shows that the biggest takeaway for B2B sellers in 2025 is that omnichannel isn’t just a buzzword—it’s the only way to meet today’s B2B customers where they are.
An omnichannel world demands businesses excel in multiple channels, including in-person sales, hybrid, inside sales, digital self-serve, and B2B marketplaces—especially during uncertain economic times in which a poor customer experience can lead to a lost sale.
In the midst of these changes, businesses often underperform in digital channels due to gaps in execution and talent. Omnichannel businesses must address these weaknesses head-on, with initiatives like acquiring in-house channel expertise and assembling architecture that supports—not hinders—omnichannel selling.
Excelling in as many marketing channels as possible is made easier with a B2B ecommerce platform that siphons your product, order, and customer data into a single platform.
Early adopter companies will be better positioned to customize their tactical approach for each platform, whether by offering unique products, running targeted experiments, or setting specific terms and conditions on each sales channel.
“With Shopify, we have our point-of-sale and ecommerce systems under one umbrella, which serves our ultimate purpose of being an omnichannel retailer and viewing the customer as one customer—no matter where they shop with us,” says Travis Boyce, head of global retail operations at Allbirds.
No longer swayed by fancy brochures or sales decks, the millennials who drive B2B purchase decisions rely on modern types of social proof. Per Forrester’s 2025 survey, current vendors, coworkers, and independent experts are the most trusted figures.
Self-service B2B commerce, a solution designed to erase obstacles and streamline the buying process, makes it easy to provide B2B buyers with the review content they’re looking for without consulting sales reps. This can take many forms:
Global retailers like Walmart continue to release self-serve tools for brands and customers alike. At the company’s first-ever seller summit, Walmart highlighted newly released tools that give a glimpse into the future of digital commerce:
Self-service platforms not only remove the need for manual sales interventions, but also improve the accuracy of transactions. This efficiency shortens your sales cycles, broadening the market that your business can target effectively.
“Right now, we have two login options, one for public consumers and one for B2B customers,” Ammar Issa, founder of AMR Hair & Beauty, says. “We have 10 different pricing tiers for B2B customers, and Shopify automatically shows them the right one based on their customer status.”
Millennials are in the driving seat of most B2B buying decisions. Known for being digital natives who are quick to adopt new payment technologies like mobile wallets, they’re applying the same concept to B2B. Buyers are moving away from card payments in favour of more flexible options. Four in five prefer bank transfers (like those through ACH), and 57% would opt for direct debit given the choice.
It’s not just the payment method that needs to be on offer. The same report found that B2B payment terms continue to be a critical factor in buyers’ supplier selection process—so much so, two thirds would abandon their purchase entirely if their preferred terms aren’t on offer.
To capitalize on this B2B ecommerce trend, ensure that your platform can do the heavy lifting for you. Relying on reminders to manually chase buyers on net-30 payment terms can cause friction and put undue strain on your sales team. With Shopify, buyers can view their payment terms up front—before they commit to an order—and receive automatic reminders as their payment date approaches.
Sustainability has been a buzzword that’s dominated the DTC ecommerce industry. Buyers are applying the same pressure to become more climate conscious through their supplier shortlists to pass on those environmentally friendly practices to the end consumer.
Bain’s recent report found almost a third of consumers practice six or more sustainable habits every day, and 70% want to adopt more sustainable habits. As a result, half of B2B buyers assign more orders to sustainable suppliers, though the study estimates this will rise substantially, to around two-thirds within three years.
The most effective way to bake sustainability into business practices is to make it a team sport—an approach deployed by Allbirds to great success. “Sustainability is an inherent filter in the way we look at anything from a product standpoint,” says Jad Finck, VP of innovation and sustainability. “But what was new was, how do we get this out to the rest of our company?
“For us specifically, it’s literally getting that into the goals outside of our team, the annual goals of the company. Last year, it was a big step forward for us to have some of those sustainability goals built into people’s bonuses, people’s goals for the year. Sometimes it’s just the nuts and bolts of saying, ‘Look, it’s on the paper. It’s now just not us being the police, but this is part of everybody’s job.’”
Replicating the B2C experience, 2026 will see more B2B ecommerce apps entering the mobile app market. This follows expectations that mobile retail ecommerce spending will account for 63% of all ecommerce transactions worldwide by 2028.
Mobile apps aren’t just digital storefronts—they’re also vital tools for communicating real-time inventory and gathering customer feedback, which is particularly crucial when companies around the world are still dealing with supply chain disruptions.
Mobile apps position B2B businesses to sell their products or services with tools like:
Brands like Shopify are following suit by digitizing more of the wholesale process. Shopify’s rollout of Shop Cash rewards to shift attention back to our Shop app represents another strategic move in light of these trends.
With these tools, B2B businesses can reach audiences they may not have previously accessed. There’s untapped mobile app potential for B2B businesses to gain visibility into customer behavior, order history, upselling, and real-time engagement.
“Customers used to be so frustrated by our platform that they’d rather call us on the phone to place orders,” says Nicholas Lachhman, associate ecommerce manager at Dermalogica. “Now we’re seeing customers be so comfortable with the experience that they’re placing orders for thousands of dollars worth of product from their mobile phones.”
Even when the economy stumbles, market leaders can’t waver when deploying competitive tech. Winning business leaders are 55% more likely than others to plan the integration of sophisticated sales technology, from tools that suggest the next best steps to features that keep existing customers from leaving.
Despite this, some B2B leaders say their digital sales platform lacks critical capabilities to sell online. Per our report, 8% think their current solution is not effective in optimizing sufficient sales channels for growth. Another 7% gave the same answer regarding integrating existing technology.
A unified commerce platform brings all business functions together under one central operating system. It unifies product, order, and customer data from all sales channels—without complex middleware and patchy integrations—to ensure:
Independent research concluded that retailers using unified commerce platforms like Shopify experience 20% faster implementation time, 34% lower data-migration and transition costs, and 22% lower total cost of ownership (TCO). These improvements lead to up to 150% omnichannel GMV growth.
“When you start looking under the hood, we were spending most of our time in building and maintaining third-party integrations, which come out of the box with a unified solution like Shopify,” says Rohit Nathany, chief digital officer at Mejuri.
The supply chain industry is in disarray, and large wholesale orders often get broken up into smaller parcels for easier delivery.
Despite these challenges, customer expectations around delivery time continue to grow higher:
The data is clear: Customer demands for speed are driving B2B commerce to optimize for faster delivery times to stay competitive. Considering 70% of decision-makers are prepared to spend up to $500,000 on a single B2B ecommerce transaction, the shipping process must not just be speedy—it should be stress-free too.
While the need for speed poses a challenge, B2B brands can use it to their advantage. For example, third-party logistics (3PL) services like the Shopify Fulfillment Network, which connects your store with leading logistics company Flexport, streamline the fulfillment process for B2B brands. In addition to lowering fulfillment costs, 3PLs also reduce inventory management costs.
Now is also the time to work out any kinks in your inventory management program. Does your software need updating? Do you have enough storage or warehouse space? Are you able to report in real time? To mitigate supply chain delays and shortages, don’t wait until the last minute to order materials or goods for peak season—order them now.
Melanie Nuce, senior vice president of innovation and partnerships at the supply chain standards group GS1 US, adds to this, explaining that B2B businesses should utilize a range of suppliers: “To maximize performance, business-to-business brands will need to focus on diversifying suppliers and potentially narrowing the number of products they offer and bringing manufacturing closer to the intended destination.”
Wholesalers tend to make multiple purchases over a longer lifespan, and how they prefer to initiate those payments is evolving. If there’s one thing we’ve learned about these B2B ecommerce trends, it’s that buyers want the DTC-style experience when purchasing on behalf of their company.
Data shows that B2B accounts for 55.2% of revenue in the subscription economy—the largest share of all markets—because subscriptions simplify the buying process. Wholesalers don’t have to remember each item they purchased, the quantities of each, and place their order before stock needs to be replenished. A regular subscription initiates the payment for their predetermined order on autopilot, leading to greater convenience for the buyer through fewer mental sticky notes.
The advantages waterfall onto your B2B business too. Revenue is predictable when customers are on a subscription, and sales teams don’t have to reach out and remind buyers to place their next order. This frees up resources they can spend more effectively elsewhere on higher-impact activities.
Instead of being limited to the capabilities provided out of the box by a B2B ecommerce platform, composable commerce uses packaged business capabilities (PBCs) that are connected with application programming interfaces (APIs) to create a tailored platform that suits your needs exactly.
Headless architecture was the first iteration in this commerce platform, separating the front-end experience from the back-end infrastructure, to offer businesses the freedom of customization.
But B2B leaders are evolving. In a recent survey done in partnership with IDC, 45% of enterprises already have a composable front end with a full-stack back end.
HVAC wholesaler Carrier uses Shopify’s composable architecture to allow more functionality and flexibility across their site. Bypassing the traditionally lengthy setup process reduced time to market to just 30 days, compared to up to 12 months on their previous platform. Cost savings were a natural byproduct—Carrier slashed costs to $10,000 per website, compared to up to $2 million per site previously.
“Historically, it’s very expensive to build the types of ecommerce experiences we need,” says Steven Duran, associate director of global commerce. “With Shopify, it takes a matter of weeks. At the pace of a startup, we are able to deploy commerce capabilities in the enterprise space. Everything you need for an enterprise selling apparatus, we’ve already built it with OneCommerce, which is built on Shopify components.”
See composable commerce in action: Discover how Commerce Components by Shopify helps enterprises quickly customize their tech stacks and accelerate growth.
Watch now:
Artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT aren’t just a means to get advice. Younger demographics—including those in the driving seat of B2B buying decisions—are relying on AI assistants to make purchasing decisions. Per one report, 57% of Gen Z and 48% of millennials consult them when shopping online.
Conversational commerce, the overall trend encompassing these AI assistants, is on the rise too. Global spending through chat-based channels is tipped to exceed $32.67 billion by 2035, as it offers real-time support while aiding product discovery through an omnichannel customer experience.
We see a similar trend in B2B, where orders were traditionally placed in person through a face-to-face conversational approach. Trade shows and conferences were the first port of call to discover new suppliers and make initial orders. Digital transformation has moved these discussions online and made them easier to facilitate—often without involving a sales rep.
Automation represents an undeniable competitive advantage commonly associated with B2C, but has become equally vital in B2B sectors. The numbers don’t lie: 71% of companies already use generative AI in at least one business function, up from 65% just one year prior.
While it’s impossible to anticipate what the future holds, predictive analytics uses AI to help you edge closer to the answer—and when it’s unified in one centralized operating system like Shopify, there’s no need to custom code solutions to put your data to work. You can:
In 2026 and beyond, organizations will pivot toward modular and API-first solutions with flexible data models, so they can better access product discovery data. This isn’t confined to your owned channels—product discovery data is as crucial on third-party marketplaces as it is on your own platform. With it you can understand what existing customers see, what they add to shopping lists, and how they behave.
As with any emerging trend, time is of the essence. Here are some quick wins to capitalize on the shift in buying behavior and opportunities for B2B digital transformation:
💡Tip: Shopify’s unified data model merges data from both Shopify features and integrated third-party apps, giving you one unified customer profile for B2B buyers—no matter where they interact with you. You get a CDP by default, without the complex middleware and expensive integrations typically required to configure one for an omnichannel business.
Future-proof your B2B ecommerce operations with the following medium-term initiatives:
Strategic shifts to transform your B2B business and grow profitability over the long term include:
As we head into 2026 and beyond, keep these B2B ecommerce trends in mind, and begin implementing the ones most aligned with your product offerings. Staying on top of new digital marketing strategies and tactics will keep your business at the forefront of customers’ minds.
We’re here to help every step of the way. Whether you’re hoping to keep your ecommerce site up to date or build the best B2B commerce experience around, we’re committed to helping make every commerce moment a great one. With Shopify as your B2B ecommerce platform, you’ll be ready to take on any challenges or emerging trends.
“If you want lower TCO, rapid deployment, and a platform that is growing at a rate faster than you can develop it yourself, then I would encourage you to look at Shopify,” says Carrier’s Steve Duran.
B2B ecommerce trends heading into 2026 include rep-free buying experiences, generative AI, increased use of social proof, flexible payment options, and omnichannel shopping experiences spanning social media and B2B marketplace.
Yes, B2B ecommerce is growing—and is expected to continue to do so in the coming years. The global B2B ecommerce market is valued at $32.11 trillion as of 2025 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 14.5, reaching $36 trillion by 2025.
The future of B2B commerce is expected to be increasingly digital, with businesses using various platforms and omnichannel technologies to engage with customers and suppliers. AI and machine learning will become more prevalent as businesses seek to optimize their supply chains, automate processes, and improve customer experience.
