Retail

Shoppers have already spent a record $5.4 billion online on Black Friday: Adobe Analytics

Key Points
  • Spending online on Black Friday hit a record $5.4 billion, according to Adobe Analytics.
  • Traffic had looked lighter at shopping malls across the country.
  • Thanksgiving Day spending online also surpassed $4 billion for the first time ever.
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Consumers clearly weren't waiting until Cyber Monday to shop online this holiday season.

Spending online on Black Friday hit a record of $5.4 billion, up 22.3% from a year ago, according to Adobe Analytics data Sunday night. The data measures transactions from 80 of the top 100 U.S. online retailers.

This comes as foot traffic appeared to be lighter at shopping malls across the country on Friday, a day that traditionally has been reserved for people to line up outside of big-box retailers and department stores to score doorbuster deals.

Total spending online on Black Friday is still forecast by Adobe to hit $7.6 billion, which would make the day the second-biggest e-commerce day ever, after Cyber Monday 2018's $7.9 billion.

Adobe is still expecting spending on Cyber Monday this year to hit an even bigger record $9.4 billion, an 18.9% jump from a year ago.

Shoppers spent a record $4.2 billion online on Thanksgiving Day, a 14.5% increase from last year, Adobe said Friday. While this marks the first year Thanksgiving spending online surpassed $4 billion, it was shy of Adobe's preliminary $4.4 billion estimate.

Top products on sale on Black Friday included "Frozen 2" toys, Nerf and Paw Patrol merchandise, the Nintendo Switch, Air Fryers, AirPods and Samsung TVs, Adobe said.

For the entire holiday season, Adobe is anticipating shoppers will spend a whopping $143.7 billion online.

A separate study by Bain & Co. has estimated Amazon will take 42% of all online sales this holiday season.

That has put more pressure on retailers like Target, Walmart, Nordstrom and Macy's to offer convenient, same-day pickup and delivery options and, of course, to have merchandise in stores around the holidays that people won't be able to find on Amazon.

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