02 June 2025 · 5 min read
Reading cart abandonment by hour in KST
A specialty food client in Daegu ran recovery emails at 09:00 KST because their email tool defaulted to UTC. Carts abandoned between 20:00 and 23:00 KST — peak browsing after dinner — received reminders nine hours early, before shoppers reconsidered.
We replotted their 90-day abandonment data in KST and overlaid send times. The mismatch was visible in one chart. After shifting sends to 21:30 KST, recovery clicks rose — modestly, but consistently across four weeks.
Patterns we see by category
Fashion and accessories: Secondary peak 22:00–00:00 KST on weekdays; stronger weekend afternoon browsing.
Home goods: Broader daytime spread; mobile abandonment spikes during commute hours when shoppers preview but defer purchase.
Food and perishables: Lunch window (11:30–13:30) and pre-dinner (17:00–19:00) dominate; late-night sends rarely help.
These are tendencies, not laws. Your store's hour chart will differ. The point is to read abandonment in the timezone your customers shop — not the timezone your server logs default to.
How to pull this yourself
Export cart-add and checkout-start events with timestamps. Pivot by hour in KST. Mark your current recovery schedule on the same axis. Gaps between abandonment peaks and send times are the first place to adjust.
If you commission our Cart Abandonment Deep-Dive, this chart is the centrepiece of the deliverable.