FisherLeadsQuick answer: in 2026, apparel is by far the most common thing new online stores sell, ahead of food and drink, beauty, home and jewellery. Among the new stores FisherLeads tracked in August 2026, apparel led every other category by a wide margin. Here is the full ranking, and what it means if you sell to new merchants.
New stores are not spread evenly across categories. A small number of niches account for most of what founders choose to sell, and knowing which ones tells you where the fresh demand is concentrated, and where your next customers are launching.
What new online stores are selling in 2026
Here is what new stores are selling, ranked by how many launched in each category in August 2026.
| Niche | New stores (Aug 2026) |
|---|---|
| Apparel | ~37,600 |
| Food and drink | ~11,000 |
| Beauty | ~9,000 |
| Home and decor | ~8,900 |
| Jewellery | ~7,000 |
| Outdoor and sports | ~5,800 |
| Accessories | ~5,200 |
| Electronics | ~4,200 |
Apparel is not just first, it is roughly three times the size of the next category. Fashion remains the easiest thing to start selling online: low barriers, endless sub niches, and a supply chain that makes launching a brand simple. Food and drink, beauty and home follow, the everyday categories where new brands keep finding room.
Why apparel leads by so much
A few things stack up in apparel's favour. The tools to launch a clothing brand are mature, print on demand and dropshipping make inventory optional, and social platforms reward visual products. For a first time founder, apparel is the lowest friction way to open a real store, so it is where the most of them start.
That does not make it the easiest place to win, but it is unmistakably where the largest share of new merchants are launching right now.
What this means if you sell to new stores
The niche a store launches in is a strong signal of what it needs next.
- Apparel and accessories founders reach for visual marketing, size and returns tooling, and fast fulfilment. If that is your product, this is your largest and fastest renewing pool.
- Food, beauty and home brands lean on subscriptions, reviews and compliance friendly tools, and often sell in regulated categories where the right partner is valuable early.
- Electronics and outdoor stores tend to have higher order values and more complex logistics, a smaller but higher value slice.
Match your outreach to the niche and you are speaking to a founder about the exact problem they are about to face.
How to reach new stores in your niche
The reliable way is a live feed that catches new stores the day they launch and lets you filter by category. As the platform for discovering newly launched ecommerce stores, FisherLeads does exactly this: it catches brand new stores across Shopify, WooCommerce, Wix and more than 30 platforms, tags each one by niche, and enriches it with a public contact.
Filter to your category, read the newest stores, and reach the founder while the store is still fresh. In August 2026 that is more than 10,000 new stores a day across all platforms, sorted the way you actually sell.
Open today’s feed of brand new stores, each confirmed live and enriched with a contact. Browse today’s new stores →