Black Friday Statistics 2025: Lessons to Prepare for BFCM 2026
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BFCM 2025 (November 28 to December 1) was another record year. Shopify and TikTok Shop both had their biggest weekend ever, and online sales grew almost everywhere you looked.
But record sales don't automatically mean record profit. Most BFCM reports stop at revenue, and that only tells half the story.
So this page covers both. You'll find the key industry benchmarks from Salesforce, Adobe, Shopify and more, plus real profit data from Shopify stores using TrueProfit: what they sold, what they spent on discounts, COGS and ads, and what was actually left at the end.
In this blog:
BFCM 2025 At A Glance
The table below highlights some of the most notable BFCM 2025 ecommerce statistics, from overall sales and platform performance to AI-driven commerce and merchant profitability.
Note: Black Friday: Nov 28, 2025 | Cyber Monday: Dec 1, 2025 | Cyber Week: Nov 25 - Dec 1, 2025 | BFCM Weekend: Nov 28 - Dec 1, 2025.
Metric | 2025 | YoY | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
Global sales, Cyber Week | $336.6B | +7% | |
Global online sales, Black Friday | $79B | +6% | |
Global online sales, Cyber Monday | $53B | +7% | |
US online sales, Black Friday | $11.8B | +9.1% | |
US online sales, Cyber Monday | $14.25B | +7.1% | |
US online sales, Cyber Week | $44.2B | +7.7% | |
Shopify merchant GMV, BFCM weekend | $14.6B | +27% | |
TikTok Shop US sales, BFCM weekend | $500M+ | ~+50% buyers | |
BNPL spend, Black Friday | $747.5M | +8.9% | |
AI-driven US online sales, Black Friday | ~$3B | traffic +805% | |
Average Shopify store net profit margin, Cyber Week | 38.4% | +40.15% | TrueProfit |
Shopify store net revenue, Cyber Week | $22.1M | +17.4% | TrueProfit |
Black Friday 2025 Sales & Revenue Recap
Here's the top-line spending picture for BFCM 2025:
- Salesforce reported $336.6 billion in sales worldwide during Cyber Week, up 7% from last year.
- Black Friday online spending worldwide reached $79 billion, up 6% YoY, Salesforce data shows.
- Salesforce also pointed out that global online sales hit $53 billion on Cyber Monday, which is a 7% increase from last year.
- In the US over the five days from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday, shoppers spent $44.2 billion online, 7.7% more than 2024, according to Adobe. Cyber Monday alone accounted for $14.25 billion, up 7.1%.
- Adobe also tracked $11.8 billion in online spending on Black Friday, up 9.1% year over year.
- NRF counted a record 202.9 million shoppers over the Thanksgiving weekend, the biggest turnout it has ever measured for the holiday.
Plus, international checkout platform Global-e saw its own 36% YoY jump in BFCM weekend sales, with the whole promotional season (early November onward) up 37%. A few more highlights from their report are:
- Black Friday made up 31% of the weekend's sales, Cyber Monday 22%.
- Growth by region: Europe +25%, APAC +21%, North America +12%.
Platform Highlights
1. Shopify
According to Shopify’s own report, merchants generated $14.6 billion in global sales over the BFCM weekend, which set a new record for the platform, up 27% year over year. Other notable figures include:
- Sales peaked at $5.1 million per minute at 12:01pm EST on Black Friday.
- 81M+ customers bought from Shopify-powered brands.
- 94,900+ merchants had their best-selling day ever.
- 15,800+ entrepreneurs made their first-ever sale.
- Top categories are: cosmetics, clothing tops & pants, activewear, fitness & nutrition.
2. TikTok Shop
TikTok reported $500M+ in US sales across the four-day sale, with roughly 50% more US buyers than the same period in 2024.
They also highlighted the tremendous growth of livestreaming, which has become a major sales driver for sellers.
- Brands and sellers hosting livestreams grew their sales 84% vs previous year.
- 760,000+ livestreams drew 1.6 billion views.
Shopper Behaviors During The Sales Season
Online vs. in-store
Online kept outpacing in-store in 2025. Mastercard SpendingPulse data shows:
- US online sales: +10.4% YoY
- US in-store sales: +1.7% YoY
That said, online sales didn't grow at the expense of stores. In-store sales still went up 1.7%, just more slowly than online. NRF also counted a record 202.9 million shoppers over Thanksgiving weekend, across stores and online combined.
Average order value
Shopify reported an average cart price of $114.70 for the weekend, or $112.29 on a constant-currency basis.
Mobile
Mobile continued to dominate. From November 1–28, mobile drove $58.7 billion in US online spend, up 6.8% YoY and accounting for 52.2% of revenue, according to Adobe.
The global picture is even more mobile-heavy: Salesforce found that mobile devices drove 70% of online orders during Cyber Week.
Online Sellers’ True Profitability
Everyone shares their BFCM revenue. Far fewer people share what was left after COGS, shipping, fees and ads.
So we looked. We took 282 USD-based Shopify stores that used TrueProfit during both BFCM 2024 (Nov 29 to Dec 2) and BFCM 2025 (Nov 28 to Dec 1), and compared how they performed year over year.
Metric | BFCM 2024 | BFCM 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
Orders | 222,013 | 247,231 | +11.4% |
$23.8M | $27.0M | +13.5% | |
Discounts | $5.38M (22.6% gross) | $5.45M (20.2% gross) | +1.4% |
$18.8M | $22.1M | +17.4% | |
$84.61 | $89.20 | +5.4% | |
$13.1M | $15.3M | +16.6% | |
69.7% | 69.2% | -0.72% | |
Ad spend | 29.3% revenue | 20.1% revenue | -19.4% |
$5.14M | $8.46M | +64.5% | |
27.4% | 38.4% | +40.15% | |
Refunds | 1.9% revenue | 1.7% revenue | -10.5% |
Our key takeaways are:
- Sales grew, but not wildly. Orders rose 11.4%, and net revenue grew 17.4%.
- Customers spent more per order. AOV climbed 5.4% to $89.20.
- Stores leaned less on discounts. Discounts were 20.2% of gross sales, down from 22.6%.
- Ad spend went down, not up. These stores spent 19.4% less on ads, and ad spend fell from 29.3% to 20.1% of revenue.
- Profit grew much faster than revenue. Net profit jumped 64.5% to $8.46M, and net margin hit 38.4%, up 11 points vs previous period.
Note: These are stores that kept using TrueProfit for a full year, so they may be a bit more profit-focused than the average Shopify store.
BFCM 2025 Trends
1. AI Traffic
AI-driven traffic to US retail sites grew 805% YoY (according to Adobe), and AI agents/AI-assisted shopping drove an estimated $3 billion in US online sales on Black Friday alone (according to Salesforce). Globally, Salesforce put AI-driven Black Friday sales at $14.2 billion.
2. Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL)
Adobe stated that Buy Now, Pay Later hit $747.5 million on Black Friday alone, up 8.9% vs 2024.
3. Discounts
Discounts peaked on Cyber Monday, according to Adobe. Electronics led the way with up to 31% off list price, followed by toys (28%) and apparel (25%).
Here's what discounting looked like for TrueProfit stores. Across 1,155 USD-based Shopify stores using TrueProfit during BFCM 2025 (Nov 28 to Dec 1):
- Discounts given: $12.6M
- Net revenue: $44.8M
That works out to roughly 28 cents in discounts for every $1 of net revenue.
4. Advertising
Ads are usually one of the biggest costs during BFCM, and the one that keeps most store owners up at night.
So where did the money actually go? Of the 1,155 stores we looked at, 692 ran paid ads over BFCM weekend 2025. Here's how their budgets were split, and what each platform says it got them in return.
Channel | Ad spend | Tracked purchase value | Purchases |
|---|---|---|---|
Meta (Facebook/Instagram) | $8.77M | $19.0M | 231,137 |
$1.67M | $3.81M | 32,783 | |
TikTok | $100K | $556K | 7,718 |
$34.1K | $88.8K | 2,045 | |
Snapchat | $12.6K | $102K | 1,422 |
From the table above, a few things stand out:
- Meta is still the main channel. It took about 82% of total ad spend, which is pretty typical for how concentrated most DTC ad budgets still are during BFCM. Meta and Google landed close together on ROAS (around 2.2x and 2.3x).
- TikTok and Snapchat look great on paper, but the budgets were tiny. TikTok reported ROAS about 5.5x and Snapchat about 8x, but together they made up only about 1% of total spend, coming from a small number of stores. Small budgets often look more efficient than they would at scale, so take these with a grain of salt.
- Not every store relied on paid ads. About 40% of stores (463 out of 1,155) didn't run paid ads during BFCM at all, yet still made sales.
How Discounts and Ad Spend Affected Profit Margin
Discounts and ads are the two levers everyone pulls hardest during BFCM. So how much did they actually cost?
Here's where every $1 of net revenue went for the 1,155 USD-based stores using TrueProfit during BFCM 2025 (Nov 28 to Dec 1):
Where each $1 went | Amount |
|---|---|
COGS | 28.8¢ |
Ad spend | 23.9¢ |
Shipping costs | 4.8¢ |
Transaction fees | 3.9¢ |
Handling and other costs | 2.1¢ |
What stores kept (net profit) | 36.5¢ |
Quick note: this covers all 1,155 stores, not just the 282 we compared year over year earlier, so the numbers here are a little different.
As we can see from the table:
1. Discounts were bigger than they look.
Before any of those costs, stores had already given away $12.6M in discounts, about 28¢ for every $1 they collected. That's almost as much as they spent on the products themselves (COGS was $12.9M). Discounts never show up as a cost line, because they come off the price before revenue is counted. That's exactly why they're easy to underestimate.
2. Ads were the second biggest cost.
At 23.9¢ per dollar, ad spend took more than shipping, fees and other costs combined (10.8¢). With a blended tracked ROAS of about 2.2x, ads still paid for themselves on paper. They just took a big bite out of margin along the way.
⇒ The takeaway: after discounts, COGS, ads and everything else, these stores kept about 36.5 cents of every dollar. Product costs and ads together ate more than half of revenue, so those are the two numbers worth watching most closely next BFCM.
Key Takeaways For BFCM 2025 And What's Next For 2026
What BFCM 2025 told us
- Sales kept growing, but steadily rather than explosively. Global and US online sales grew around 6% to 10% year over year. Shopify merchants did better than average, with BFCM weekend sales up 27%.
- Shoppers bought on their phones, and increasingly through AI. Mobile drove 70% of online orders worldwide during Cyber Week, and AI-driven traffic to US retail sites grew 805%.
- Revenue growth and profit growth are two different stories. For the 282 stores we tracked across both years, net revenue grew 17.4% while net profit grew 64.5%. Most of that gap came from costs, mainly ads.
- Discounts cost almost as much as the products. Stores gave away about 28¢ in discounts for every $1 of net revenue, close to what they spent on COGS.
- Spending more on ads wasn't the only way to grow. Those same 282 stores cut ad spend by 19.4%, yet still sold more and kept more. And about 40% of the 1,155 stores we looked at didn't run paid ads at all.
What to plan for BFCM 2026
BFCM 2026 runs from Black Friday, Nov 27 to Cyber Monday, Nov 30. Here's where to focus before it arrives:
- Track profit, not just revenue. A record sales day can still be a weak profit day. Check net profit daily during BFCM so you can adjust while the sale is still running.
- Set a discount limit before you set the discount. Work out how much margin you can give away per order, then build your offers around that number instead of matching competitors.
- Know your break-even ROAS. At an average of about 2.2x across the stores we tracked, ads paid off on paper but took nearly 24¢ of every dollar. Knowing the ROAS where you start losing money tells you when to scale and when to pull back.
- Make your store easy to buy from on mobile and easy for AI to understand. Clear product titles, accurate descriptions, and a fast mobile checkout matter more each year.
Harry Chu is the Founder of TrueProfit, a net profit tracking solution designed to help Shopify merchants gain real-time insights into their actual profits. With 11+ years of experience in eCommerce and technology, his expertise in profit analytics, cost tracking, and data-driven decision-making has made him a trusted voice for thousands of Shopify merchants.
