Digital Service Innovation platforms are progressively being adopted across various sectors, including government institutions, to enhance service delivery, promote ease of doing business, and improve transaction efficiency for citizens. Despite these advancements, several barriers continue to hinder users’ intention to adopt such platforms, as explained by the Innovation Resistance Theory (IRT). This work applies IRT to investigate the influence of barriers: functional and psychological on both the intention to use and recommend e-government (e-gov) applications. The findings indicate that Image, Risk, and Tradition Barrier do not affect the intention to recommend e-gov platforms. Similarly, Tradition and Value barriers are not predictors of the intention to use the application. Conversely, Image, Risk, and Usage Barrier showed significant influence on the intention to use, while Usage and Value Barrier significantly affect the intention to recommend. These results suggest the need for policies and approaches intended to enhance the adoption of e-gov applications by addressing and mitigating the identified barriers.