Highlights. More than 99% of American consumers read online reviews before making purchases; reviews influence 93% of consumers’ purchasing decisions.
- 92% of consumers read online reviews of a local business before making their first visit.
- Up to 84% of consumers place as much trust in online reviews as they do in personal recommendations; among 18- to 34-year-olds, this share increases to 91%.
- Online reviews influence 30% of consumers’ local shopping decisions.
- Local businesses average 39 reviews and 4.4 stars (out of 5).
- 40% of consumers suspect a review is fake when it reads like it was written by AI.
Online Review Conversion Rate Statistics
A product’s conversion rate refers to the share of browsing shoppers who ultimately make a purchase.
- Conversion rates peak with a 4.9 out of 5 rating.
- Reviews from verified buyers increase conversion 15%.
- Conversion rates increase 270% when online retailers display five (5) or more product reviews.
- Increased conversion rates are more dramatic for luxury (380%) than for low-priced items (190%) when retailers display reviews.
- The first five (5) reviews have the highest impact on conversion rates.
- Large enterprises that increased their replies to online reviews from 10% to 32% saw an 80% increase in conversion rates.
Online Review Consumer Engagement
Online reviews have become a primary point of consumer engagement as users write, read, and share ratings.
- Consumers spend an average of 13 minutes and 45 seconds and read 10 online reviews before they decide to trust a local business.
- 48% of consumers only read reviews written within the previous 2 weeks.
- The number of reviews a business has influences the purchasing decisions of 60% of consumers.
- 75% of consumers regularly read reviews for local businesses.
- 91.1% of consumers typically read at least one review before purchasing a product; 54.7% read at least four reviews.
- 38% of consumers only leave positive reviews for brick-and-mortar businesses; 10% only leave negative reviews.
- Only 4% of consumers never write online reviews.
- 81% of consumers are most likely to leave reviews for businesses that go above and beyond to provide an exceptional experience.
- 31% of Americans read customer reviews to gather product information.
Online Review Business Engagement
88% of consumers are likely to choose a business that replies to all reviews, an 87.2% higher rate than businesses that do not respond to reviews.
- 53% of consumers expect a business to respond to negative reviews within a week.
- 71% of consumers are more likely to use a business that responds to online reviews.
- 89% of consumers read responses to reviews from the business.
- 70% of online reviews result from businesses requesting feedback from customers following a transaction.
- In 2024, 45% of consumers were offered a discount for leaving a business review, up 73.1% year-over-year (YoY).
- 80% of consumers were prompted by a local business to leave a review in 2024.
- 69% of customers have left reviews after being prompted by the business.
- 32% of people report being likely to leave a review when requested by a business via email; 28% are likely to do so when requested in person.
Online Review Consumer Confidence
Consumers are increasingly more receptive to online reviews.
- 54% of American consumers trust crowd-sourced review websites; 21% distrust online reviews.
- 24% of U.S. consumers are undecided about whether or not they trust online reviews.
- 43% of consumers find online customer reviews very helpful when making purchasing decisions.
- From 2015 to 2018, consumers were 70% less likely to distrust online reviews as a rule.
- Also from 2015 to 2018, consumers became 28% less likely to trust online reviews only under certain circumstances and more than twice as likely to trust reviews all the time.
Online Review Rating Statistics
Most review sites use a 5-point scale with averages expressed to the first decimal point.
- A 1.0-point (out of 5) rating increase boosts a restaurant’s revenue between 5% and 9% and raises a hotel’s room rates by 11%.
- A 0.1-point (out of 5) online rating increase may boost the brick-and-mortar store’s foot traffic up to 25%.
- The average verified buyer leaves a 4.34 out of 5 rating, which is 13.9% higher than the average rating among anonymous reviewers (3.89 out of 5).
- 85% of consumers consider a business’s star rating to be the most important aspect of their online reviews.
- Only 24% of consumers would consider choosing a business with an average rating below 3 stars.
- 37% of consumers only consider businesses with an average rating of 4 stars or higher.
Online Review Fraud Statistics
Fraudulent online reviews are usually positive reviews that the product manufacturer or seller has purchased; for example, some retailers offer store credit in exchange for positive reviews.
- 82% of shoppers look for negative reviews to establish credibility (studies indicate that consumers mistrust 5-star reviewed products as “too good to be true”).
- 54% of consumers will not purchase a product if they find fake or fraudulent online reviews.
- Consumers browsing online reviews are 514% more likely to focus on negative as opposed to positive ratings.
- 49% of consumers are confident they have seen fake reviews on Amazon in 2024, down 9.26% from 2023.
- 42% of shoppers report seeing fake reviews on Facebook in 2022, up 13.5% YoY.
- An estimated 64% of supplement reviews and 63% of beauty product reviews are fake.
- Electronics and sneakers also have high rates of fake product reviews, reported at 61% and 59% respectively.
Online Review Website Statistics
73% of all online reviews are Google reviews.
- 81% of consumers use Google to read reviews and evaluate local businesses.
- 42% of consumers trust Google most for travel accommodation reviews; 31% prefer TripAdvisor.
- There are over 1 billion reviews on TripAdvisor as of 2023.
- 44% of consumers refer to Yelp for business reviews; 21% use TripAdvisor.
- As of 2022, there are over 265 million reviews on Yelp.
- Of the 128.5 million monthly visitors to Yelp.com, 72.5% access the site on their mobile devices or through the Yelp app.
- 10% of all social media users in the U.S. use the review website Yelp.
- In 2023, 45% of consumers read reviews on Facebook for local businesses; 20% use the Better Business Bureau.
- The online book review website Goodreads has over 90 million user-submitted reviews as of 2019; another 26 million new book reviews were added between October 2022 and October 2023.
These data and insights were compiled by the Capital One Shopping team based on publicly available data.
Sources
- Northwestern University Spiegel Research Center, How Online Reviews Influence Sales
- National Public Radio, Why We Usually Can’t Tell When a Review is Fake
- National Institute of Health Library of Medicine
- Uberall, Learning Hub
- Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, Bulletin 2022-05
- PickHVAC, Local Review Statistics
- Statista, Industry Overview
- BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey
- Martech, Study finds 61 percent of electronics reviews on Amazon are ‘fake’
- Goodreads, Working Together to Protect the Authenticity of Ratings and Reviews on Goodreads