Apr 30, 2025
If you’ve built a great app, you know that you need to keep your users engaged until they actually pay. But if your checkout flow isn’t rock solid, you’ll lose users at the most critical moment. Here's the hard truth: A poor checkout flow kills conversions. Fast. Today, I want to break down three common mistakes that destroy conversions and three things you can do to actually win at checkout.
Three Conversion Killers
1. Mandatory Account Creation
When users hit “Buy,” they expect a fast and smooth payment process. If you interrupt them by asking to create an account first, you’re adding a barrier at the worst possible moment. Especially on mobile, where patience is lower, every extra step increases the possibility for the customer to drop-off.
Solution: Allow guest checkout by default. Give users the option to create an account after they completed the purchase and lure them to do so with additional benefits (discount or loyalty scheme). Focus on getting the conversion first, you can always build customer loyalty later.
2. Hidden Costs at the Last Moment
One of the quickest ways to kill trust is by hiding fees until the final step. Users feel tricked when they think they’re paying €10, but suddenly it becomes €16.49 because of extra charges. It leads to frustration, abandoned carts, and negative word-of-mouth. Low budget airlines are notorious for this.
Solution: Be upfront with all costs. Show taxes, shipping fees, and service costs early in the checkout process. Even if you do not know everything upfront you can show estimated costs like many shops do. The user should never feel surprised at the payment step.
Overcomplicated Payment Forms
Filling out a long form on mobile feels tedious. Manually entering addresses, payment details and unnecessary fields adds friction with every extra input. Like I said before users on mobile are less patient. Each additional field is a chance for the user to get distracted, make a mistake, or give up.
Solution: Minimize the required fields. Use autofill features, and integrate wallets like Apple Pay and Google Pay wherever possible. Make the process feel effortless: Amazon's one click checkout should be the goal.
Three conversion enablers
Smart default choices
Help users move faster by pre-filling logical defaults: country codes, shipping methods, and even saved payment methods. Make sure to use the phone or browser's default options for autofill. Users love feeling that the app "just gets them" or provide one tap suggestions.
Progress indicators
Nobody likes an unclear checkout process. A good flow should show clear steps ("Step 1 of 3") so users know exactly where they are and how close they are to done. Make sure that the steps make sense for example: cart => shipping details => payment
Wallets
If your app supports mobile wallets, you're removing almost all friction from the checkout. No card numbers, no billing address, no extra typing just face ID or a fingerprint and done. It’s fast, secure, and trusted by users. If you're not offering wallet payments, you're leaving conversions on the table.
