AOV
What one order is worth, and the cheapest number to move when traffic won't grow.
What it means
AOV is the average value of an order: Gross Sales after discounts, divided by the number of orders in the period. Gross Sales is item price × quantity, so what's being averaged is the goods. Shipping charges and tax aren't in it, and refunds aren't taken back out of it — which is why AOV multiplied by OrdersOrdersA simple, powerful demand signal; watch its trend. doesn't come back to Total Sales.
It's an average across orders, not across customers. One unusually large order moves it, and on a short range or a thin day it moves it a lot.
Show the math
Formula and a worked example
Gross Sales is item price × quantity, counted before any discount comes off.
Discounts is what came off those items. Orders is the number of orders placed in the period.
Worked example. March: 1,500 orders carrying €112,500 of Gross Sales, with €7,500 given away in discounts. AOV = (112,500 − 7,500) ÷ 1,500 = €70.
Those same orders also billed €5,000 of delivery and €21,000 of tax, and €4,000 came back as refunds. Total Sales for the period is 112,500 − 7,500 + 5,000 + 21,000 − 4,000 = €127,000 — which across 1,500 orders is €84.67 per order, not €70.
Both figures are right. AOV answers what the goods in an order were worth; the other answers what landed in the account. Expect them to differ by roughly your tax and delivery share, and don't reconcile one to the other.
It answers the question
What is one order worth to you? At the same traffic and the same conversion, revenue moves point for point with this number — which makes it the one growth lever that doesn't need more visitors.
Why it matters
There are only three ways to grow: more visitors, more of them buying, or each order being worth more. The first costs money and the second takes months. This one can move in a fortnight with a threshold or a bundle, which is why it's usually the first thing to try.
It also sets what you can afford to pay for a customer. NCPANCPAWhat it costs to win a first-time buyer. above AOV means the first order doesn't cover what you spent to win it — and since AOV is revenue before any cost at all, the bar you actually need to clear sits well below it.
The caveat comes after the claim: AOV can rise while profit falls. Bundles and thresholds usually buy the bigger basket with margin, so read it beside % Product Discounts% Product DiscountsHow heavily a product is marked down.Under 8% is healthy before you count a win.
What good looks like
There's no published band here, and a euro figure couldn't honestly carry one — a coffee refill business and a furniture shop are both healthy at completely different order sizes, and the same business reads a different number in every currency it sells in. The app does colour the AOV card in-product against a band held per currency, so what you see there is already adjusted for the money you trade in.
Judge it three ways instead. Against your own trend, comparing ranges of the same length. Against your NCPA, since an order worth less than it cost to win is the one reading that needs no context. And split it — the Breakdowns and Region tables carry AOV by country, by day, by discount code and by customer type, and the spread across those rows tells you far more than the blended figure does.
How to improve it
| Lever | What you do | Expect | How long | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fast Move the free-delivery threshold just above today's average | Set it high enough that one more item gets a typical basket over the line | AOV up, order count roughly flat | 1–2 weeks | You now give away delivery on the orders that clear it, so Shipping Cost rises — and some baskets that sat under the old line never convert at all. Watch Orders for two weeks. |
| Fast Offer the second item at checkout | Add a one-click upsell tied to what's already in the cart | AOV and AOQ move together | 1–2 weeks | Another step between the shopper and the confirm button. Any conversion it costs you comes straight off order count, and that is a worse trade than it looks. |
| Slow Bundle slow movers with the sellers | Build two or three bundles priced under the cost of buying the items separately | AOV up and units up | 1 quarter | The discount that makes a bundle attractive is margin. % Product Discounts rises and Gross Margin can fall while this number climbs — the classic way to grow AOV and earn less. |
| Slow Raise price where you don't compete on price | Reprice the lines shoppers choose for reasons other than being cheapest | AOV up with no change to what's in the basket | 1 quarter | Price costs conversion, so the same traffic buys fewer orders. AOV rising while Orders falls is a smaller business with a prettier average. |
Every lever costs something somewhere. The last column is the one to read twice.
Read it with
Sales are orders multiplied by order size. Neither half means anything without the other, and they are on the same cards.
Growing on both halves
More orders, each of them bigger. Revenue is growing faster than either number on its own suggests, and nothing was traded away to get it.
Fewer, bigger baskets
Order size grew and demand didn't follow. Common after a price increase or a delivery threshold set too high — the average improved by losing the smaller shoppers.
Busier and cheaper
More orders, each worth less. Usually a promotion or a cheap entry product doing the work — real growth, bought at a price you should know.
Losing on both
Fewer orders and smaller ones. This is a demand problem rather than a merchandising one, and no bundle fixes it.
Value per order against items per order. AOV up with AOQ flat means people are buying the same number of things at higher prices — a price or mix change. AOV up with AOQ up means baskets genuinely got fuller. The first is fragile if a competitor undercuts you; the second is merchandising you can repeat.
What an order is worth against what a new customer cost to win. The gap between them is everything you have left to pay for the goods, the delivery, the fees and yourself. Watching AOV alone lets acquisition costs drift up underneath a number that looks stable.
Common misreads
It never will. Delivery charges and tax are in Total Sales and not in this, and refunds come off Total Sales and not off this. Two different questions, two different answers.
Check % Product Discounts and Gross Margin for the same period. A discounted bundle raises the basket and thins the margin at the same time, and this number can only see the first half of that.
On a short range one wholesale-sized order moves the average by itself. Check the order count for the same range, and re-read it on a month before you build a plan on it.
Also called
Average Order Value · average basket value · average basket size · average order size
See yoursYour AOV for the period with its trend, beside the order count and the ad spend it took to produce them.
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