South Korean Prime Minister Kim Min-seok (L) visits tech giant Naver Corp.’s data center, Gak Sejong, in Sejong, South Korea. Photo by YONHAP / EPA
March 9 (Asia Today) — South Korea’s e-commerce market is showing signs of shifting toward Naver after a personal data breach at rival platform Coupang, with user traffic and transactions increasingly moving to Naver’s shopping ecosystem.
Data compiled by WiseApp Retail showed that Naver Plus Store recorded 7.5 million monthly active users in February, up 5.9% from the previous month.
Coupang still leads the market with 33.1 million monthly active users, but its user base declined 0.2% during the same period, suggesting changing momentum in the sector.
Naver’s shopping transaction volume has also grown rapidly.
According to Samsung Securities, Naver Shopping’s transaction volume rose 28% year over year in February, outperforming both the overall market and Coupang’s growth rate, which remained in the 10% range.
The growth has become a key driver of Naver’s business performance.
In the fourth quarter of 2025, the company’s commerce division posted revenue of 1.054 trillion won ($790 million), up 36% from a year earlier.For the full year, commerce revenue reached 3.69 trillion won ($2.76 billion), a 26.2% increase and the fastest-growing segment of the company’s business.
Naver is also expanding logistics services to compete more directly with Coupang’s fast delivery network.
The company has set a goal of increasing the share of its N Delivery service to 50% of Smart Store transactions within three years.
Partnerships with logistics and retail companies are expected to support that effort.A joint service launched with grocery platform Kurly, called Kurly N Mart, has recorded monthly transaction growth of more than 50%, according to the company.
Analysts say artificial intelligence-based recommendation technology is also strengthening Naver’s platform ecosystem by increasing user engagement.
The Naver Plus Store app, which operates as a standalone shopping application, surpassed 12.9 million cumulative downloads by the fourth quarter of last year and was named one of the top new shopping apps in the Asia-Pacific region, according to analytics firm Sensor Tower.
The company also introduced a shopping AI agent in beta in February that provides personalized product recommendations and search assistance.
Growth in commerce has also boosted the company’s fintech payments ecosystem.
Naver’s payment volume reached 23 trillion won ($17.2 billion) in the fourth quarter of 2025, up 19% from a year earlier.
Oh Dong-hwan, an analyst at Samsung Securities, said Naver’s commerce expansion is likely to continue.
“Strengthened delivery capabilities, membership benefits and differentiated AI shopping services will support sustained high growth for Naver Shopping,” Oh said.
— Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI
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Original Korean report: https://www.asiatoday.co.kr/kn/view.php?key=20260309010002364
