Despite persistent inflationary pressures, U.S. shoppers spent a record-breaking $44.2 billion online during Cyber Week, the five-day period from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday, according to ecommerce data tracked by Adobe.
That includes projections for the final hours of Cyber Monday. In total, Adobe expected Cyber Monday’s online sales to hit $14.2 billion.
Cyber Week was bolstered this year by a surge of AI-driven traffic to retail sites, which increased 805% year-over-year on Black Friday. Shoppers who clicked through to retail sites from an AI service were 38% more likely to buy something when compared with traffic from other sources, according to Adobe’s data.
Spend on Black Friday totaled $11.8 billion in the U.S., a 9.1% year-over-year increase that outpaced Adobe’s expectations of around $11.7 billion.
While the day after Thanksgiving has historically been the day for in-person holiday sales, the gap between Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales continued to shrink this year as the deeper discounts hit ecommerce earlier.
Between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. on Black Friday, people spent $12.5 million per minute online, the software giant reported.
Over the next two days—Nov. 29 and 30—shoppers spent another $11.8 billion online, up 8.7% year over year.
Consumers opt to ‘buy now, pay later’
Amid persistent inflation and rising prices, consumers opted for more flexible payment methods during the first day of the 2025 holiday shopping season.
Buy now, pay later payment options accounted for $747.5 million in online spend in the U.S. on Black Friday, up 8.9% year over year, according to Adobe. Adobe’s survey respondents said they were most likely to use flexible payment options for electronics, apparel, toys, and furniture.
Adobe predicted that BNPL usage would cross $1 billion by the end of Cyber Week. Between Nov. 1 and Nov. 30, shoppers spent $9 billion using BNPL payment options.
Elsewhere, shoppers are using smartphones to buy this year instead of on a desktop. On Thanksgiving, 61.6% of online sales happened via mobile. On Cyber Monday, that’s expected to hit about 58% of sales, representing around $8.2 billion in spend and up 7.9% year over year.
