# Free-shipping line on product pages: +21% conversion, not significant

- Outcome: Flat / inconclusive
- Page type: Product page (Ecommerce)
- Elements: Shipping & delivery messaging
- Test run by: [Clean Commit](https://liftarchive.com/practitioners/clean-commit/)
- Commentary by: LiftArchive (our analysis, not theirs)
- Original source: https://cleancommit.io/ab-tests/free-shipping-eligibility-message-added-to-product-pages/
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/cc-free-shipping-eligibility-message-added-to-product-pages/

Adding the line "This product is eligible for free shipping" to product pages showed a 21.0% higher conversion rate, but the result was not statistically significant. Clean Commit ran this test for an anonymized Shopify store and published it in its A/B test library. We count it as inconclusive because the sample was small and the test had only 15% power.

## Result

**+21% conversion, not significant**

- Conversion rate: +21.0%. The variant had an 84.6% probability of beating the original, which is short of significance.
- Revenue per visitor: +31.7%, and orders: +16.7%. Both point the same way but rest on the same small sample.
- Average order value: +8.8%.
- Add-to-cart rate: -2.9%, a negative signal. Clean Commit says the drop came from desktop, where add-to-cart fell 16.3% on only 453 visitors.
- Inconclusive overall: with 4,128 visitors and 15% statistical power, lifts this large usually shrink on a retest.

## Control

The product page did not say anything about free shipping. Shoppers had no way to know from the page whether delivery would cost extra.

## Variant

A line reading "This product is eligible for free shipping" was added to the product page, so shoppers saw it before adding to cart.

## Why it likely came out this way (our reading)

- Unexpected delivery costs are a common reason to abandon. Stating free shipping on the product page removes that doubt early.
- The message costs nothing to read and sits where the buying decision happens.
- The lift is probably inflated. Small, underpowered tests tend to overstate the true effect, so the real gain is likely smaller.
- The add-to-cart dip on desktop suggests the effect may not be the same on every device.

## Caveats

Only 4,128 visitors over 26 days with 15% statistical power, so the result is not significant and Clean Commit labeled it a positive signal. Expect the lift to shrink if you retest it.

## How to run this test

- Hypothesis: If we state clearly on the product page that the item ships free, then more visitors will buy because they stop worrying about extra costs at checkout.
- Primary metric: Conversion rate (orders per visitor)
- Guardrail: Add-to-cart rate
- Guardrail: Revenue per visitor
- Guardrail: Average order value
- Who should test it: Stores that already offer free shipping on some or all products but don't say so on the product page. It won't help if free shipping is already obvious site-wide, or if you charge for delivery.

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Credit: Clean Commit ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/cc-free-shipping-eligibility-message-added-to-product-pages/).
Usage: Free to use, quote and build on, with credit and a link: name the practitioner or organization that ran the test and link to its LiftArchive page. The results belong to the practitioners who ran and shared them; the summaries and commentary are LiftArchive's.