The traditional use of shadowing is to give 2-dimensional drawings the illusion of 3D depth.

This example shows the same “button” with and without shadowing

var canvas=document.createElement("canvas");
var ctx=canvas.getContext("2d");
document.body.appendChild(canvas);

ctx.fillStyle='skyblue';
ctx.strokeStyle='lightgray';
ctx.lineWidth=5;

// without shadow
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(60,60,30,0,Math.PI*2);
ctx.closePath();
ctx.fill();
ctx.stroke();

// with shadow
ctx.shadowColor='black';
ctx.shadowBlur=4;
ctx.shadowOffsetY=3;
ctx.beginPath();
ctx.arc(175,60,30,0,Math.PI*2);
ctx.closePath();
ctx.fill();
ctx.stroke();
// stop the shadowing
ctx.shadowColor='rgba(0,0,0,0)';