Cyber Monday Breaks Records Following Robust Black Friday

After declining for the first time ever last year, Cyber Monday spending is back to setting records with online stores pulling in a grand total of $11.3 billion over the course of the day, per Adobe Analytics. The figure marks a 5.8% jump from last year when retailers seemed to spread out discounts and promotions across the month of November, resulting in a slight dip in Cyber Monday shopping. The strong showing comes on the heels of record-breaking online sales for Black Friday and Thanksgiving weekend as well despite worries that inflation and the prospect of an economic slowdown might impact holiday spending this year. Shopping on Cyber Monday was driven mainly by toys, up 684% compared to an average day in October, as well as electronics and computers, which saw 391% and 372% more demand respectively. Sporting goods, appliances, books and jewelry also proved to be especially popular categories this year. Holiday Shoppers Want Reassurance and Social Commerce In terms of specific products, Pokémon cards, Legos, Hot Wheels, Disney Encanto merchandise and LOL Surprise dolls won the day. Gaming consoles, especially the PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch and Xbox Series X, also flew off the digital shelves, as did popular games like FIFA 23, God of War Ragnarök, Madden 23, NBA 2K23 and Pokémon Scarlet & Violet. Among the other top-selling products were smart TVs, Apple AirPods and MacBooks, tablets, smart watches, instant pots and air fryers. Peak spending came in the hour of 11 p.m. to 12 a.m. eastern time, during which Americans were spending $12.8 million a minute online, Adobe estimates. Despite worries about low holiday spending this year amid economic uncertainty, Adobe Digital Insights lead analyst Vivek Pandya said big markdowns this year helped to bring value-minded shoppers online. "With oversupply and a softening consumer spending environment, retailers made the right call this season to drive demand through heavy discounting," Pandya said in a statement. "It spurred online spending to levels that were higher than expected, and reinforced ecommerce as a major channel to drive volume and capture consumer interest." Indeed, Adobe found that discounts reached record highs this year with electronics boasting an average of 25% off the list price versus 8% last year, toys seeing 34% price cuts (versus 19% last year), computers 20% (versus 10% last year) and televisions 17% (versus 11% last year). Consumers were also drawn to delayed payment options this year with orders tapping buy now, pay later plans jumping 85% from the week prior. This year also marked the first time in which a majority of online sales between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday came from mobile shopping: 51% came from phones as compared to 46% last year. Cyber Monday's haul brings the holiday shopping season to date's spending up to $107.7 billion online, up 8.7% over this point last year. Adobe's analysts expect the period to finish strong with a $210.1 billion total through Dec. 31, which would mark a 2.75% increase from last year. Adobe's data comes from analyzing direct consumer transactions online across around 1 trillion visits to U.S. retail sites, 100 million inventory units and 18 product categories.