WooCommerce checkout validation is essential for ensuring smooth order placement and order management.
A poorly validated checkout process frustrates customers and leads to lost sales. A proper WooCommerce checkout validation reduces errors, enhances satisfaction, and boosts conversions, ensuring a seamless experience.
Additionally, a validated checkout process ensures the store owner collects all the necessary information to process the order successfully.
By default, WooCommerce validates the required field; however, it doesn’t validate optional fields like phone numbers or custom fields.
In this blog post, we’ll explain how WooCommerce checkout validation works. In addition, we will share how you can validate the phone field and custom field at checkout.
So, let’s begin.
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WooCommerce checkout validation refers to the process of verifying the accuracy and completeness of customer information entered during the checkout process in a WooCommerce store.
This validation ensures that all required fields are filled out correctly and checks for valid data formats.
This effective checkout validation enhances the shopping experience by providing real-time feedback on errors, ensuring data consistency.
Validating the checkout form field is extremely important in online shopping. Here are some of the reasons why you must validate WooCommerce checkout fields:
Validation helps detect mistakes before they become problems. For example, checking the format of email addresses or ensuring required fields are completed prevents users from submitting incorrect information, which can lead to issues with order fulfillment and communication.
Collecting accurate data is crucial for successful order processing and customer relationship management. It ensures that the information collected during checkout is valid and reduces the likelihood of issues later in the sales process.
A well-functioning checkout process reflects professionalism and attention to detail. When customers feel confident that their information is being handled correctly, they are more likely to trust your brand and return for future purchases.
A seamless checkout experience is vital for customer satisfaction. By validating inputs and providing immediate feedback, customers are guided smoothly through the checkout process, leading to higher conversion rates.
One of the primary reasons customers abandon their carts is due to a complicated or frustrating checkout process. Proper validation ensures that all required fields are filled out correctly, minimizing errors and helping customers complete their purchases without complications.
Effective WooCommerce checkout validation ultimately leads to increased sales. By streamlining the checkout experience and ensuring accuracy, you reduce barriers to purchase, encouraging customers to complete their transactions.
Yes, WooCommerce validates certain fields by default during the checkout process.
Here’s how WooCommerce validation works:
If any validation fails, WooCommerce displays clear error messages to inform users about what they should correct and guide them through the checkout process.
You can see the error message example below:
WooCommerce provides basic validation, but store owners might need to customize it for specific needs or appearance. You may also want to validate fields that WooCommerce doesn’t check by default. For instance, validating optional fields like phone numbers ensures accuracy. Learn how to enhance the validation process and validate phone fields in the next section.
The default WooCommerce, while it validates the important required form field, is not enough to ensure a seamless shopping experience for customers.
For starters, it’s too long, and the design is very basic and not at all user-friendly. Plus, according to the Baymard Institute, 28% of shoppers abandon their carts because the checkout process is lengthy and complex.
The solution is to swap the default, boring checkout page with a multi-step, conversion-friendly one. Add inline validation, and your checkout will be all set to boost sales easily.
You can easily add a multi-step checkout to your WooComerce store with FunnelKit Funnel Builder. This is the best checkout field editor with that powers over 20,000 WooCommerce websites worldwide.
With this plugin, you can replace the default checkout page with a beautiful conversion-optimized multi-step checkout page. You can use any of the popular page builders like Elementor, Divi, Oxygen, Gutenberg, etc.
Along with adding a multi-step checkout, you can also include:
In this blog, we will cover two key things: how to validate optional fields, like the phone field, and how to add and validate custom fields as well.
To learn more details about FunnelKit Funnel Builder, watch this video
The phone field is a crucial part of the order process as it enables you to contact the customer for emergencies and shipping updates.
Entering the wrong phone number can lead to significant issues, such as delays in product delivery and challenges in reaching the customer when necessary.
The good news is you can easily validate the phone field in WooCommerce checkout without any raw coding.
As mentioned earlier, to add validation for the phone field in WooCommerce checkout, we will use FunnelKit Funnel Builder.
This WooCommerce checkout validation plugin not only validates all basic fields but also offers phone field validation, ensuring the phone number matches the selected country. When you choose a country in the billing address field, the phone field automatically displays the country’s flag and correct prefix.
If the phone number format is incorrect, it will display an error message.
Make sure to install and activate both the free and premium versions of FunnelKit Funnel Builder.
Now follow these steps to validate the phone field on your checkout page:
Firstly, we need to create a store checkout that will replace the default WooCommerce checkout page.
To do so, navigate to FunnelKit ⇒ Store Checkout and click on the ‘Create Store Checkout’ button.
FunnelKit Funnel Builder offers many pre-built templates. Choose your favorite page builder. After that, hover over the template and click Preview.
To import the template, hit Import This Funnel, provide a name, and hit Done.
Now you should have a new store checkout with 3 steps: Checkout, upsell and thank you.
You can edit the content and design of your checkout page.
For more details, you can refer to our blog:
✅ WooCommerce one-page checkout
✅ WooCommerce multi-step checkout
Next, you need to add the phone field to your checkout page.
Note: If your checkout template already has the phone field, skip this part.
Edit the checkout page, scroll down to the “Checkout Form Field” section, and simply drag and drop the phone field.
We are adding it next to the billing address field.
The next step is to enable inline validation for all the checkout fields. For this, move to the Optimization tab, expand the Inline Field Validation option, and choose yes to enable.
Make sure to hit Save to update.
Scroll down a little to find the “Enhanced Phone Field” option. Here you need to enable this feature to set up phone number validation with the selected country.
After enabling, you can also choose to save the phone number with or without country code in the order.
Also, to help the users, you can also add a phone help text.
After setting up phone field validation on the checkout page, make sure to save it.
Along with phone field validation, you can optimize the checkout page using other features.
Find all the details in our blog, 23 WooCommerce Checkout Optimization Hacks.
Like the checkout page, you can customize the upsell offer and thank you page as well.
The final step is to enable the store checkout. For this, just hit the “Enable store checkout”.
This will make your store checkout active and live on your WooCommerce store.
Now try to test a place order and you should see an error message if the entered phone number doesn’t match format of the selected country.
That’s how simple it is to add validation to the phone field in WooCommerce checkout using FunnelKit Funnel Builder.
With FunnelKit Automations, you can add any type of custom field to your WooCommerce checkout page and add validation.
To do so, make sure you are the one in the Checkout Form Fields section and click on the Add New Field button.
For example, here we are adding a preferred delivery time field.
Now, to validate that users must provide this information, make sure to turn on the Required toggle.
After creating, drag and drop the custom field on the checkout form.
For more details, you can read our blog on “How to Add a Custom Field to WooCommerce Checkout Page”
Now, try to place an order. If the custom field is not completed as required, a validation error message will appear.
This is how you can validate any custom field.
Real-time validation allows users to correct information instantly, reducing friction and frustration. Instead of waiting until the form is submitted, users can fix errors as they go. For instance, If an email address is entered incorrectly, an error message should display right away, not after the user tries to submit the form.
When validation fails, provide clear, specific error messages that explain what went wrong and how to fix it. This helps users quickly understand and correct errors, reducing chances of cart abandonment. Instead of a generic "Enter the correct" message, use messages like “The provided phone number is not valid”.
Mark fields as required only when necessary to avoid overwhelming users with too many required inputs. As a standard practice, use a “*” symbol next to required fields to indicate that they are mandatory. To keep the checkout page clean, consider making optional fields collapsible.
Match the input field types to the data being requested (e.g., use the email type for emails, number type for phone numbers, etc.). This ensures that users enter data in the correct format, reducing validation errors and speeding up form completion.
WooCommerce checkout validation helps users place orders quickly without making mistakes, ensuring a smooth and seamless ordering process that leads to customer satisfaction.
Additionally, collecting all the necessary information correctly will allow for more efficient order management.
Our experts highly recommend using the inline custom field validation and the enhanced phone field option available in FunnelKit Funnel Builder.
With this sales funnel builder, you can boost the average order value of your WooCommerce store with pre and post-purchase offers like order bumps and one-click upsells.
Get FunnelKit Funnel Builder today, and optimize the shopping experience in your WooCommerce store with modern checkout field optimization options!
