Uzbekistan Country Commercial Guide
Learn about the market conditions, opportunities, regulations, and business conditions in uzbekistan, prepared by at U.S. Embassies worldwide by Commerce Department, State Department and other U.S. agencies’ professionals
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According to the government statistics, the e-commerce market of Uzbekistan in 2024 was $1.2 billion or 3.8% of the retail market. KPMG forecasts that e-commerce market penetration will reach 9-11% of the retail market by 2027 and will be between $1.8 and $2.2 billion. Consumers mostly buy appliances and electronics (35%) and fashion products (19%) online, followed by home products (3%), food, drinks and tobacco (3%) and health and beauty products (2%). Sixty percent of the country’s population is under the age of 30. The government is investing in telecommunications infrastructure. According to DataReportal, there were 32.7 million (87.2% of population) internet users in Uzbekistan at the start of 2025. The number of cellular mobile connections reached 33.9 million. 

Uzbekistan launched 5G cellular network technology in 2023. The throughput of international data transmission channels was expanded to 4,200 Gbit/s. Speedtest.net ranks Uzbekistan 75th out of 143 countries in mobile internet, with 54.62 Mbps download and 16.57 Mbps upload speed. It ranks 73rd out of 182 countries in fixed broadband internet with 88.09 Mbps download and 83.71 Mbps upload speed. Foreign electronic service providers pay 12% value-added tax. Uzbekistan’s law permits electronic checks and invoices as legal confirmation of payment for goods and services. The Central Bank of Uzbekistan signed a 2019 memorandum of understanding with Visa to develop infrastructure for digital payments, and many banks offer payment software and services to e-commerce websites to facilitate processing of online payments. To increase the number of IT professionals in e-commerce, Tashkent University of Information Technologies opened an e-commerce department in 2018. 

The government took several important steps to boost e-commerce growth: 
 

  • Adoption of the Digital Uzbekistan-2030 Strategy in October 2020: The government plans to increase the length of the fiber-optic communications network built throughout the country from 118,000 kilometers (73,322 miles) to 250,000 kilometers (155,343 miles) by 2030, increase the high-speed internet coverage level from 67% to 100% by 2030, and increase the annual quotas for admission to higher and secondary special education institutions in the field of information technology from 7,000 to 20,000 by 2030.
     
  • Launch of the National Online Trading Platform https://www.unisavdo.uz/ by Ozbekiston Pochtasi (the state postal service company) in March 2021. Entrepreneurs are now able to put their products up for auction through the system; Ozbekiston Pochtasi will deliver purchased goods to a buyer’s address and, thus, assume responsibility as a guarantor between seller and buyer; the state company planned to increase the number of logistics centers from 4 in 2021 to 30 in 2025 and the number of items posted on the platform from 10,000 in 2021 to 1,500,000 in 2025; the number of local and international online stores for cooperation was expected to increase from 10 in 2021 to 125 in 2025. As of August 2025, the platform had exceeded that target, with 176 registered sellers. 
     
  • The Uzbekistan Export Promotion Agency established cooperation with Chinese e-commerce firm Alibaba in October 2020, creating a “Made in Uzbekistan” section on the Alibaba.com platform, where products of selected domestic companies are exhibited. In August 2023 the administration of Namangan region announced that Alibaba would open its regional center in Namangan. In May 2025 the Ministry of Investments, Industry and Trade of Uzbekistan and Alibaba Group agreed to launch the Alibaba Export Accelerator – Uzbekistan program for 100 Uzbek companies, as well as enable direct sales of products through Aliexpress, Tmall, and Taobao marketplaces. An agreement was reached also with JD.com to establish a “Made in Uzbekistan” online pavilion and supply products in a B2B2C format through logistics hubs in China.
     

Potential in-country partners include the Ministry of Digital Technologies (https://mitc.uz/en/management/index-former Ministry for Development of Information Technologies and Communications), the Ministry of Investments, Industry and Trade (https://miit.uz/en),the Association of E-Commerce of Uzbekistan, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Uzbekistan (https://chamber.uz/en/index) and the American Chamber of Commerce in Uzbekistan. 

Legal & Regulatory environment towards ecommerce

National Agency of Prospective Projects (https://napp.uz/en) is the regulator of the e-commerce industry in Uzbekistan. 

The Cabinet of Ministers is responsible for implementation of state policy and programs in e-commerce and coordinates the activities of state bodies in this field. Law #ZRU-792 “On Electronic Commerce” was issued in 2022. Under the law, electronic transactions should provide customers with the following information about the seller: 

  • The full name of the legal entity, with an indication of its organizational and legal form, or the surname, name, and patronymic of an individual;
  • Postal and e-mail address, and information about company’s state registration;
  • The availability of a license in cases stipulated by law;
  • The procedure for concluding an agreement in e-commerce;
  • The possibility and procedure for making changes and additions to the agreement in e-commerce when agreeing on its terms;
  • The procedure for sending and withdrawing an acceptance;
  • Terms of delivery and payment for goods (including works, services), as well as offered prices (including applicable tariffs) for them;
  • Indications of the conditions included in the agreement by reference to an electronic document posted in a publicly available information resource;
  • A record of all electronic documents and messages should be retained.


In 2021, amendments were made to the Law on Personal Data, obliging foreign companies to store personal data of Uzbek citizens in the territory of Uzbekistan. The amendments went into effect in April 2021, and communications regulator UzKomNazorat restricted access and issued warnings to international social media firms not in compliance with the law. Social networks were unblocked in August 2022 and January 2023. 

In December 2024, the Cabinet of Ministers issued the Resolution #885 “On measures for the further development of the sphere of electronic commerce in the Republic of Uzbekistan”, which introduced definitions of e-commerce operators (electronic trading platform, order aggregator and digital streaming service) and set several requirements for them to do business in Uzbekistan, including establishing a legal entity here. As these new requirements caused questions, the National Agency of Perspective Projects clarified that foreign online service providers can continue doing business in Uzbekistan and don’t have to establish a legal entity if they keep paying a required 12% VAT. 

In May 2024, the government issued a Resolution #256 “On approval of normative legal documents on antimonopoly regulation in commodity and financial markets”, which also describes the procedure for identifying the dominant position and dominant bargaining power of a digital platform operator and an operator’s actions that lead to restriction of competition and (or) infringement of the rights and legitimate interests of consumers and other economic entities. The resolution lists and prohibits the actions of such operators that abuse their dominant position or dominant bargaining power. Uzbekistan agreed to implement the UNESCO Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence, the IMF paper on Elements of Effective Policies for Crypto Assets, and the Global Data Security Initiative. 

Consumer Behavior

Uzum, established in 2022, is the largest local digital ecosystem and includes services for online shopping (marketplace), fintech solutions, payments (BNPL), and delivery. According to the company founder and CEO, more than 17 million people in Uzbekistan use Uzum services every month and more than 2 million people use Uzum bank cards, with delivery service available in 25 cities across the country. The company has 1,000 pick-up points in 253 areas of Uzbekistan. Its FY2024 consolidated GMV (gross merchandise value) totaled $345 million, growing 2.4х year-on-year. In August 2025 the company raised $70 million in equity financing from Tencent and VR Capital with participation of FinSight Ventures bringing its valuation to $1.5 billion. 

Other local marketplaces are Asaxiy, Olcha, Glotr. OLX is popular for individual-to-individual trades. Major international e-commerce players operating in Uzbekistan are AliExpress (China), Wildberries (Russia), Yandex (Russia), Ozon (Russia). Consumers buy some goods on Amazon and eBay. Telegram is the most popular messaging app in Uzbekistan, used by more than 70% of the population. State organizations, media and private companies have Telegram channels. Individuals mainly use Telegram to communicate and do business. Local companies also actively use social networks (Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Odnoklassniki) to promote their products and services. According to DataReportal, there were 11.7 million users of Instagram, 2.3 million users of Facebook, and 2.57 million users (aged 18 and above) of TikTok in 2025. Several banks offer entrepreneurs and companies payment tools to set up e-commerce services on their websites and applications, which enable their customers to pay for products and services online. 

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