Germany’s E-commerce Market: 4 Trends Shaping Marketplace Strategy

In Germany, the marketplace model has already won. The question now is what makes one marketplace worth choosing over another.

According to the German E-Commerce and Distance Selling Trade Association (bevh), marketplaces generated 56% of German online sales of goods in 2025. German shoppers have embraced the model, so for marketplace operators the challenge has changed: customers already use marketplaces, so you need to give them a reason to choose yours.

This article opens our Country Focus series on Europe’s e-commerce markets. It looks at four trends shaping the German market — a competitive landscape with strong category specialists, marketplaces expanding their reach, evolving consumer preferences and well-established cross-border shopping — and at what they mean for your assortment.

Marketplaces dominate German e-commerce

Online shopping is firmly established. According to Eurostat, 81.4% of people aged 16 to 74 in Germany shopped online in 2025, compared with an EU average of 73.6%.

Marketplaces have taken the lead. According to the bevh, online sales of goods reached €83.1 billion in 2025, up 3.2% on the previous year. Marketplace sales grew faster, rising by 4.9% to €46.2 billion, or 56% of online sales of goods. The Online-Monitor 2026 of the German Retail Federation (HDE) reaches a similar conclusion, with marketplaces accounting for 56.7% of online sales.

Growth through volume is slowing. The HDE notes that marketplace growth is no longer as clearly ahead of other formats: in 2025, sales on marketplaces grew by 5.4%, against 3.8% to 4.0% for the other formats. The model has matured, which makes differentiation the central question for every marketplace.

 

A competitive landscape with strong category specialists

According to Marketplace Universe, Germany has 23 key marketplace platforms for sellers, from generalists to category specialists in fashion, electronics, home and living, DIY and garden, sports, and beauty and care.

Specialists compete on selection. Zalando is described by Marketplace Universe as indispensable for mid-range and premium fashion brands, but difficult to join, as it runs a highly selective marketplace. MediaMarktSaturn, for its part, is pursuing a “new verticals” strategy that opens its marketplace to many new categories, and sellers perform best in niches its physical stores do not cover.

Specialist retailers are lagging online. According to the HDE, the online share of specialist retailers has barely moved since the pandemic. In fashion, it stood at 11.2% in 2025, far below the 44.2% online share of the fashion market as a whole.

 

German marketplaces are expanding their reach

OTTO is opening up. Until recently, selling on otto.de required a German legal entity and VAT number. Since March 2026, Dutch companies can sell directly on the German marketplace, and a pilot programme with Polish sellers was announced for June 2026, with other EU countries to follow. New partners go through a vetting process designed to ensure a high-quality assortment.

Kaufland is expanding abroad. Kaufland Global Marketplace is extending its presence across nine European countries, with Spain and the Netherlands added in 2026.

The two strategies differ, but both show that Germany’s leading marketplaces are looking beyond their domestic market, and OTTO’s approach shows they are doing so selectively.

Consumer preferences are evolving

The category mix is broadening. According to the HDE Online-Monitor 2026, fashion and electronics remain the largest online categories in Germany, with €21.2 billion and €19.7 billion in online sales in 2025. Their combined share, however, fell to 44% of online sales, compared with more than 50% in 2017: other categories are catching up.

Second-hand is gaining momentum. Online sales of second-hand goods reached €10.5 billion in 2025, up 5.3%, growing faster than new goods (+3.9%). Books account for the largest second-hand share, followed by fashion and electronics. According to the HDE, second-hand purchases are driven both by sustainability and, more and more, by the wish to save money.

 

Cross-border shopping is well established

German shoppers already buy abroad. According to the HDE Online-Monitor 2026, 65% of German online shoppers have already bought from a foreign online seller: 26% do so deliberately, and 39% only realised afterwards that the seller was based abroad. Among those who order abroad, France ranks as the second most popular country of origin (22%), and other European countries follow, including the Netherlands (19%), Austria and Italy (15% each), Spain (13%) and Poland (11%).

This widens your potential seller pool. International sellers can bring brands, products and category depth not yet available locally, which is particularly valuable when your objective is differentiation. Integrating them also takes work: OTTO’s requirements for its new European sellers include German-language customer service, shipping from a warehouse in Germany or the EU, and returns accepted in Germany or selected EU countries.

 

From “how many products”  to “which products and sellers”

For marketplaces, the strategic question is shifting from “How many products can we offer?” to “Which products and sellers will make us more relevant?”

AI is raising the bar. According to the HDE, more than one in five German internet users already use AI for product research. Among people who use AI chatbots, 35% use them when buying products, mainly to compare product features (64%), quality (58%) and price (51%). When comparison happens before the visit, a relevant, well-described assortment matters even more.

This is why seller recruitment should start with your marketplace strategy:

• Which categories do you need to grow?
• Where does your catalogue lack depth?
• Which price points are underrepresented?
• Which brands or types of products could attract new customers?
• Which sellers have the operational capabilities your marketplace requires?

Answering these questions before recruiting sellers turns seller acquisition from a volume exercise into a growth strategy.

 

What this means for your marketplace

Compete on relevance rather than size. With marketplace growth converging with other formats, adding products will not be enough to stand out. Identify the categories and price points where your catalogue lacks depth, and recruit for those.

Look beyond your domestic seller base, selectively. German shoppers already buy from foreign sellers, and leading German marketplaces are opening up to them. Selection criteria (local-language service, delivery, returns) matter as much as reach.

Make your assortment easy to compare. As more shoppers research products with AI before buying, complete, well-structured product information helps the right products stand out.

 

What Octopia’s experience shows

At Octopia, we see access to a qualified seller ecosystem as a key driver of marketplace competitiveness and long-term growth. With more than 10,000 active sellers and a selection rate below 2%, our experience shows that selectivity does not slow growth: sellers recruited in the past 12 months account for an average of 60% of the GMV generated.

Marketplaces such as OnBuy and PcComponentes already work with Octopia to develop their assortment across Europe.

Conclusion

Germany combines several characteristics that marketplace operators now encounter across Europe: highly digital consumers, marketplaces that account for the majority of online sales, and leading platforms widening their seller base beyond national borders. In this environment, growth depends less on the number of products available and more on the relevance of the assortment.

For Germany, and for the wider European market, the question is no longer simply how to build a larger marketplace. It is how to build a better one.

Stay tuned for the next edition of our Country Focus series, exploring another key European e-commerce market.