The record-breaking spending trend continued into Cyber Weekend — the Saturday and Sunday following Thanksgiving and Black Friday — as U.S. ecommerce sales once again hit new highs, according to new data from Adobe Analytics.
On Small Business Saturday and the subsequent Sunday, consumers spent a combined $10.9 billion online. That’s up 5.8% year over year.
To help put that into context: U.S. online shoppers spent $10.8 billion on Black Friday 2024 sales. On Thanksgiving, consumers had spent $6.1 billion online.
“Discounts have exceeded expectations beginning on Thanksgiving, and Cyber Monday has essentially become ‘last call’ for shoppers looking to get the best deals this season,” said Vivek Pandya, lead analyst at Adobe Digital Insights, in a statement. “We are on track for a Cyber Week, the 5-day period between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday, that crosses the $40 billion mark online and sets a new record for U.S. e-commerce.”
Adobe Analytics data is based on more than 1 trillion visits to U.S. retail sites, 100 million SKUs and 18 product categories, according to the company. 200 online retailers in the Top 1000 use Adobe Analytics for their web analytics, and 97 use it for site design and development. Top 1000 online retailers also use it for content delivery and management, as an ecommerce platform, a marketing platform, for personalization and more.
The Top 1000 is Digital Commerce 360’s database of North America’s largest online retailers based on their annual ecommerce sales.
Cyber Weekend ecommerce sales
From Thanksgiving through Sunday this year, U.S. consumers spent $27.8 billion online, according to Adobe data.
And if Adobe’s projection that consumers spend $13.2 billion on Cyber Monday is correct — or exceeded — then it would be the first time the Cyber 5 generated more than $40 billion in ecommerce sales.
This was also the first time since 2019 that the Cyber 5 dipped into December. The Cyber 5 refers to the five-day period from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday. In 2019, just as in 2024, Cyber Weekend was Nov. 30 and Dec. 1.
Net-new demand, as opposed to higher prices, continues to drive consumers’ online spending, according to Adobe Analytics.
Adobe said its Digital Price Index shows ecommerce prices have fallen consecutively for 26 months (down 2.9% year over year in October 2024). It said its figures are not adjusted for inflation, but growth in consumer spending would be even strong if online deflation were factored in.
Ecommerce platform provider Shopify said its U.S. merchants had an average order value of $154.26 from Black Friday through Sunday. Its merchants’ top five product categories by orders were:
- T-shirts
- Skin care
- Vitamins and supplements
- Makeup
- Hoodies
Shopify also shared that 6% of sales in that time frame were cross-border orders.
In North America, 117 of the Top 1000 online retailers use Shopify as their ecommerce platform.
According to ecommerce platform provider Salesforce, the top-growing verticals in the U.S. on Cyber Weekend were:
- Food and beverage (24% increase year over year)
- Luxury apparel and handbags (up 15%)
- General apparel (up 12%)
Part of that correlated with verticals that had the highest discount rates in the U.S. on the Saturday and Sunday following Thanksgiving:
- General apparel (38% off listed price)
- Health and beauty (25% off)
- Home, including appliances, furniture and dining (21% off)
Global Cyber Weekend online sales in 2024
In 2024, global online sales during Cyber Weekend grew 8% year over year, according to Salesforce data.
Salesforce data also estimates that U.S. online sales during Cyber Weekend increased 9% year over year. In Europe, they grew 7%.
Global order volume grew 7.5% globally, Salesforce said. It grew 8% in the U.S. and 9% in Europe. Additionally, average selling price increased 3% year over year globally, as well as 6% in the United States and 2% in Europe.
“Despite the anticipation and careful planning that consumers put into Cyber Week, the discounts haven’t quite met expectations this year,” said Caila Schwartz, director of consumer insights at Salesforce, in a statement. “Nevertheless, shoppers still made a significant number of purchases thus far, demonstrating their resilience and eagerness to capitalize on the season’s deals.”
Over Cyber Weekend, discounts averaged 206% globally, down 3% year over year. In the U.S., they averaged 28%, which is a 2% year-over-year decrease. And in Europe, they averaged 23%, which is also a 2% year-over-year decline.
“As supply chain costs remain troublesome and discounts underwhelm, retailers are treading cautiously into 2025,” Schwartz said. “The upward creep of average selling prices and less generous Cyber Week promotions signal a concern among retailers about protecting their margins in the face of persistent economic headwinds.”
Consumers placed 20% of Cyber Weekend orders for buy online, pick up in store (BOPIS), according to Salesforce data.
Salesforce draws on global shopping data from more than 1.5 billion shoppers from its Commerce Cloud, Marketing Cloud and Service Cloud platforms. In North America, 76 of the Top 2000 online retailers use Salesforce as their ecommerce platform. In 2023, those 76 online retailers combined for more than $136.077 billion in web sales.
Do you rank in our databases?
Submit your data and we’ll see where you fit in our next ranking update.
Sign up
Stay on top of the latest developments in the online retail industry. Sign up for a complimentary subscription to Digital Commerce 360 Retail News. Follow us on LinkedIn, X (formerly Twitter), Facebook and YouTube. Be the first to know when Digital Commerce 360 publishes news content.