Fewer Americans Shopped Black Friday Despite Record Spending

America’s biggest retailers kicked off the holiday shopping season with record spending.

However, the actual number of people shopping during the Thanksgiving-to-Cyber-Monday stretch declined slightly this year, according to data published Tuesday (Dec. 3) by the National Retail Federation (NRF).

Still, the 197 million people who shopped this year was the second-highest tally on record, the NRF said in a news release — after last year’s 200.4 million — and exceeded the federation’s initial projection of 183.4 million shoppers.

“Thanksgiving weekend retains its prominence among holiday spending events and continues to play a significant role in the holiday season for both consumers and retailers,” NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay said.  “Even with this year’s shortened shopping period and the multitude of early sales promotions from retailers, this past weekend exceeded expectations in terms of the sheer volume of shoppers.”

According to the NRF, 126 million consumers shopped in stores during the five-day stretch, up for 121.4 million last year. Meanwhile, the number of online shoppers totaled 124.3 million, down from 134.2 million in 2023.

Black Friday, the NRF added, was the most popular day for both brick-and-mortar and eCommerce shopping. The organization reported 81.7 million consumers shopped in stores on that day, the highest since the pandemic, and up for 76.2 million last year. Around 87.3 million shopped online, down somewhat from 90.6 million in 2023.

Cyber Monday was, once again, the second most popular day for eCommerce, with 64.4 million shoppers, down from 73.1 million last year.

“The online event continues to evolve, with a majority (63%) of Cyber Monday online shoppers opting to use their mobile device, up from 55% last year and the highest since NRF first started tracking this,” the federation said.

While fewer people may have visited malls and online marketplaces during the long Thanksgiving weekend this year, other recent data shows that those who were shopping were spending more.

For example, Adobe Analytics found that Black Friday shoppers spent a record $10.8 billion this year, a 10% increase over 2023. For Cyber Monday, the total came to $13.3 billion, a 7% increase compared to last year.

Meanwhile, America’s twin retail giants, Walmart and Amazon, both reported record sales as the holiday shopping season kicked off.

For example, Walmart’s Marketplace had its highest sales day and recorded a single-day conversion rate record during the period from Nov. 25 to Dec. 2.  And Amazon announced Tuesday that it had also seen record sales — while selling a record number of products — during the Black Friday week/Cyber Monday period.