Philippine consumers are still reluctant when it comes to make online purchases due to the lack of online trade infrastructure in the country, a recent report has unveiled.

According to Digital Life 2012 study released by consumer research firm TNS, an increasing number of consumers are searching the internet before making an acquisition but they prefer to make the actual purchase offline.

Research has indicated that most of consumers who perform online research are looking for a new car, with 18 percent of them researching only online and 84 percent conducting online and offline research before purchasing.

According to findings of the study, certain categories have started to register online purchases, with holiday or travel purchases reaching 8 percent, computer peripherals 2 percent, clothes and shoes 1 percent and personal computers or laptops and tablets 1 percent.

The study has also shown that 50 percent of Philippinese online users are still accessing the internet using their personal computers at home, while 49 percent use internet cafés. Also, 12 percent of consumers access the internet via mobile devices and only 1 percent of them use tablets.

According to results, 54 percent of Philippinese have stated that they have used the internet. The internet is mostly used by individuals aged 34 and below, with the younger age groups having had very recent online access.

The study has also found that 85 percent of consumers ages 16 to 20 have accessed the internet within the past four weeks, followed by 74 percent of consumers between ages 21 to 24. Regarding genre distribution, results have shown that 58 percent of male consumers accessed the internet as compared to 52 percent females.

The study is based on a sample of 1000 local respondents.