IOSR Journal of Business and Management (IOSR-JBM) e-ISSN: 2278-487X, p-ISSN: 2319-7668. Volume 20, Issue 5. Ver. I (May. 2018), PP 01-05 www.iosrjournals.org DOI: 10.9790/487X-2005010105 www.iosrjournals.org 1 | Page An Insight into Usage of Shopping Apps Among Youth Prof. Priyanka Patel 1 , Dr. Bijal Zaveri 2 1 Faculty of Management Studies, Parul University, India. 2 Faculty of Management Studies, Parul University, India. Corresponding Author: Prof. Priyanka Patel Abstract: With the exponential growth of technology, a variety of Smartphone apps have penetrated in our lives. Smartphone apps enable consumers to use their Smartphone to look out of all the daily activities which also includes shopping. The objective of the paper is to study the usage, motivating and hindering aspects of shopping apps amongst youth. For achieving the objectives of the study, survey was conducted using a structured questionnaire. A sample size of 125 respondents, who have used shopping apps for purchasing online was taken for the purpose of the study. The paper concludes that there is no association between gender and usage frequency for the shopping apps among the youth. It also identifies that Ease of use followed by choices available and Discounts & Offers are the top most factors considered for App based shopping. Amazon and Flipkart are the most popular shopping apps amongst users. The study also determines that respondents generally prefer to install and use less numbers of Shopping Apps due to its large storage space requirement and too much notifications. Keywords: Smartphone Apps, Shopping apps, Ease of Use, Discounts and Offers, Apps installed --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date of Submission: 16-04-2018 Date of acceptance: 05-05-2018 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I. Introduction Mobile apps can be defines as “end- user software applications that are designed for a mobile device operating system and which extent that device’s capabilities.”[10] People use Mobile apps to satisfy a broad range of needs, such as entertainment, communication, information, and commerce. There are apps available for games, Social Networking, Video, News, Navigation, Weather, Banking, Shopping and Productivity. India has proved to be optimistic in the shopping apps, which recorded 440% growth in retail app downloads, which has outpaced the developed countries like US and Japan. [5] Youth are heavy users of Smartphone, more likely to download apps to their phone than any other age group. Thus, this survey based research tries to study the youth’s usage of shopping apps and the motives behind using it. The study generates a profile regarding the shopping apps awareness and its usage and the factors considered in app based shopping. The literature identified several aspects like usefulness, ease of use, convenience and enjoyment that make a technology accepted among consumers. Thus, in this study, it is tried to explore the usage of shopping apps as well as determining various factors that influence the use of shopping apps. The success of mobile based shopping depends on aspects like transaction safety, website design, the quality of information, reputation, reliability, convenience of use, interactivity, the advantages of using customers’ databases, good products and services, and easy accessibility. Convenience of use is the degree of comfort and ease users feel with a certain system. Being easy and convenient to use will work as an important factor in increasing consumer satisfaction and loyalty to a certain brand. Easy and user-friendly systems are accepted more speedily and used more widely by consumers than complicated ones. Eye-catching designs and exciting interactivity with certain applications can be another pleasant experience. An easy-to-navigate app that delivers a suite of key functionalities and mobile services through an intuitive, entertaining user interface is something customers will certainly want to download and use steadily. [11] Perceived usefulness and ease of use are the main beliefs about a new technology that influence the attitude towards their use and predict the intentions to use and adopt this technology; the TAM is the most widely used theor etical concept in this area. [6] There are various uncertainties which result in different perceived risk dimensions that hinder mobile payment (m-payment) acceptance. [9] Further, There are four interaction-based benefits in the context of mobile apps, namely: learning benefits, social integrative benefits, personal integrative benefits and hedonic benefits. With regards to purchase intentions, only learning benefits and hedonic benefits are found to generate intension. Finally, the study confirms the relationship between consumer satisfaction and purchase intentions.[1] Two elements create very different experiences for the consumer with regards to viewing fashion online, the first area identified functional product viewing, allows the consumer to personalize how they view and interact with the garment stimulating more utilitarian effects, whilst the second area, aesthetic fashion information is driven by the retailer providing