Whether or not we’re in an AI bubble, the technology will have a longer-term impact on our lives and work. And until that bubble bursts, we’re in a heightened state of attention and investment in AI. And as that culminates, we enter the 2025 holiday season, meaning a potential collision of AI and shopping.
Anticipating that moment of impact, Adobe has made a rather optimistic prediction about AI’s role in holiday shopping this year. Specifically, it projects generative AI-powered shopping to grow 520 percent year-over-year. Adobe’s unit of measurement seems to be AI-driven traffic to U.S. retail sites.
Either way, this is a meaningful jump. It follows the 1,300% increase in AI traffic to U.S. retail sites seen in 2024. Though that was a much larger jump, it’s only because this behavior is growing from a small base. Massive percentage jumps can be expected in the first year that any technology grows from near-zero.
Backing up, what are we talking about here when we say “generative-AI-powered shopping?” Adobe defines this as using AI for research prior to purchasing something. This can include things like querying ChatGPT about a product, or using any AI engine to compare products or find the best deals.
Deals & Demand
Much of the above is based on Adobe’s survey, so it’s at least grounded in real (if aspirational) consumer sentiments. Specifically, among 5,000 U.S. consumers, 53 percent report that they may use AI for shopping, including recommendations (40%), deal-finding (36%), and gift inspiration (30%).
Adobe also projects that AI shopping will be done across product categories, but its growth will be particularly pronounced in toys, electronics, jewelry, and personal care. These categories map to popular holiday gift items, but could also be primed for AI if they’re hard to find or likely to have deals available.
Stepping back to Adobe’s broader research and expectations for this holiday season, it projects $253.4 billion in total spending in the U.S.. If this target is hit, it will be a 5.3 percent jump over the 2024 holiday season, says Adobe, which is reflective of macroeconomic factors like the economy and spending power.
Driving this year’s sales will be consumer demand for discounts. In fact, Adobe projects that products will be 28 percent off MSRP on average. For similar reasons, Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) will drive $20.2 billion in online spending. which is $2 billion more (up 11%) from the 2024 holiday shopping season.
Hit the Mark
Going deeper into the specific shopping patterns that Adobe projects, Cyber Monday will be the biggest shopping day of the year, up 6.3 percent to $14.2 billion in spending. Black Friday will trail closely behind and likewise see a spending jump, to the tune of 8.3 percent year-over-year at $11.7 billion.
Mobile shopping will likewise drive things, reaching a record 56.1 percent of transactions. That’s up from 54.5 percent last year and 51.1 percent in 2023. Though the mobile market is mature, this figure could continue to tick up as smartphone screens keep getting larger on average, and mobile natives grow.
Social media is also driving considerable spending. Specifically, the online spending that results from social advertising is expected to grow 51 percent year-over-year. In terms of product categories, the most growth will be seen in electronics ($57.5 billion), apparel ($47.6 billion, and furniture ($31.1 billion).
So how does Adobe come up with all the above? It uses a combination of survey data, as noted, and large-scale traffic analysis. For the latter, it looks at more than one trillion visits to U.S. retail sites as the basis for a predictive model. We’ll watch closely to see if Adobe was able to hit the mark this year.
