Per-Merchant Refund Rates in German E-Commerce — 2025
Review Full Year 2025: ABOUT YOU leads German merchants with a 22% refund rate; Amazon sits below 0.3%
Info
- Sample size
- n = 11,769
- Data date
- Full Year 2025
- Segment
- All segments
- Platform
- Market
- Germany
Analysis
ABOUT YOU's 22% refund rate heads the 2025 German merchant ranking, clustered with ASOS (13%), H&M (13%), TikTok Shop (16%), Temu (14%), and Zalando (10%) at the top — a group united by fashion-heavy assortments and explicitly returns-friendly positioning. Germany's fashion e-commerce sector is projected to reach nearly €33 billion by 2029, and generous return policies remain a core acquisition tool: 85% of German online shoppers say a clear, free return policy is critical to their purchase decision. At the opposite end, Amazon (0.2%), AliExpress (0.3%), and eBay (0.4%) record near-zero rates, reflecting the platform mechanics of large marketplaces where refunds are often handled outside standard email confirmation flows, making them harder to detect. Temu's 14% rate is notable given that Stiftung Warentest rated its return experience 'very good' in March 2025 — the highest score among seven tested platforms — suggesting the volume is enabled by a frictionless process rather than product failure. For marketplace strategists, this spread confirms that return-rate benchmarks must be read alongside platform architecture, not just product category.
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Methodology
Refund rate is calculated per merchant as the share of orders with at least one item flagged as a refund, return, or cancellation, divided by that merchant's total tracked orders in 2025. Only merchants with at least 30 tracked orders and at least 5 refunded orders are included. Merchants are ranked from highest to lowest refund rate. Amazon and Apple's rates are likely understated because their post-purchase refund notifications are less consistently matched to original order records than those of fashion-native platforms — the gap to fashion is real, but the precise floor for these platforms may be higher than shown.
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