Three ways holiday shopping this year will be different from past years

• Holiday season discounts will reach new heights Adobe Analytics.
• Holiday discounts will likely start earlier than expected and not be as focused on Black Friday.
• According to the report Cyber Monday is the most popular day to shop this year.

According to an online-shopping forecast, 2022 holiday sales season will see record lows in electronics, toys and computers. Adobe Analytics.

To project holiday spending for this year, the report looked at one trillion transactions made online.

The report revealed that online holiday sales in the US will reach $209.7 billion this holiday season. This is 2.5% more than last year. This is still a higher figure than the $204.5 billion that shoppers spent online during the 2021 holiday shopping seasons. However, the growth rate for this year is the Slowest pace since 2012. 

Here are three ways that shopping this holiday season will be different than previous years.

1. Expect record-breaking savings for shoppers

Adobe reported that record-breaking discounts of up to 32% are possible this year due to inventory oversupply, as well as soft consumer spending behavior.

Discounts on computers are expected to be as high as 32% — up from 10% in 2021 — while discounts on electronics could hit 27% this year, per Adobe.

Thanksgiving Day (November 24) will be the best day for electronics shopping, while Black Friday (November 25) will offer the best television deals, according to the report. Big discounts are expected to pile up on November 26 for toys.

The report says that Sunday, November 27 will offer the best deals on apparel and sporting goods. And Cyber Monday — which falls on November 28 and flows into Cyber Week— will see steals on computers and furniture, per the report.

2. The holiday shopping season begins earlier

The holiday season is expected to be impacted by earlier spending, with discounts being offered on big shopping days like the second Amazon prime sales event — Prime Early Access — on October 11 and 12. 

Patrick Brown, vice president of growth marketing at Adobe, stated that “the shape of the holiday season this year will be different.”

From January through August, consumers already spent over $590 billion online this year — 8.9% more than they did in the same time frame last year, Brown added. 

Robust online sales during Amazon’s first Prime Day this year — held on July 12 and 13 — drove July spending to $73.7 billion spent in July, up 20.9% on the year. Adobe reported that early discount events would “encourage some consumers to begin their shopping sooner and impact Cyber Week performance.” 

3. Thanksgiving and Black Friday shopping will lose some of their shine

As ecommerce is more mainstream, shopping days like Thanksgiving and Black Friday are becoming less popular. Abode stated that Cyber Monday, the year’s largest shopping day, will likely eclipse them.

Adobe projects Cyber Monday sales of $11.2 billion, which is 5.1% more than last year.

Black Friday online sales, however, are expected to rise by just 1% annually at $9 billion. Thanksgiving sales are expected to drop by 1% annually to $5.1billion.