2025 ecommerce trends and predictions

For retail, the holiday season is the great magnifier. 

Along with the flurry of shoppers and the outsized wave of online orders, come emerging trends. Trends that were once little-noticed become entrenched in the wake of the holiday madness. 

A widely accepted gift card origin story, for instance, traces them back to McDonald’s early offer of Christmas gift certificates. Today, gift cards are a year-round staple for most retailers. 

Since the dawn of the smartphone era, mobile commerce has surged during the holiday season. In 2023, mobile sales overtook desktop for the first time during the holiday season, according to Adobe. Now it appears that mobile will very soon overtake desktop during the rest of the year, too.

So it’s a valuable exercise to look at some of the trends we’re seeing and chatter we’re hearing during Holiday Season 2024 to tease out a set of 2025 ecommerce predictions that will evolve from Q4 trends.  

Here are seven 2025 ecommerce predictions that the holiday season tells us are worth watching: 

1. The rise of the value-seeking shopper is not a temporary blip.

   They are here to stay. The segment of consumers that self-identifies as “value-seeking” rises and falls with the economic times, but its direction has been reliably upward. A Signifyd analysis of third-party research shows the shift from the pandemic until this year.

   In 2020, 35% of consumers said they were value-seeking. By 2022 “revenge shopping” had fueled a shift in thinking. The portion of self-identified value-seeking shoppers dropped to 27% as consumers who had been cooped up during the pandemic emerged and enthusiastically bought luxury items and splurged on experiences, such as travel and entertainment.

   It didn’t hurt that many households were sitting on ample savings that had built up during the days of confinement and due to government relief payments meant to goose the post-COVID economy. By this year, the pendulum was swinging back and 43% of shoppers called themselves value-seeking.

   

   The growth in this bargain-hunting group was spurred by higher prices, economic uncertainty and slowing job growth. But it undoubtedly reached new heights because for many it became a habit. Consumers traded down and tracked down discounts. And you know what? The world didn’t end. Satisfaction didn’t fizzle. In fact, generations of shoppers — specifically younger generations — literally wore their consumer savvy like a badge of honor on social media. “Dupe culture,” the celebration of finding low-cost duplicates of high-fashion luxury goods, ruled supreme.

   EY says these new bargain basement devotees are not going back — at least not in significant numbers. And they’re likely to be joined by more like-minded consumers in 2025. EY’s survey found that for 48% of consumers, brands are not a key consideration when making a purchase. Moreover, 38% of consumers said they didn’t intend to switch back from private label brands to their go-to brands even if prices moderated.

   All this means merchants in 2025 will want to evaluate their private label strategies and consider whether they are in a strong position for this growing group of shoppers. They’ll want to have some serious discussions about their discounting and promotions strategies and consider whether they can craft ways to appeal to bargain hunters without seriously damaging their profit margins. They’ll want to explore providing value beyond offering lower prices by, for instance, providing expertise and advice around their offerings and the activities associated with them.

   Yes, fashion and fads come and go, but the upward trend of value-seeking shoppers won’t fade anytime soon.
   

   2. Consumers will continue to spend in 2025 after fueling a successful holiday season for online retail — if not for all online retailers.

      An analysis of Signifyd data shows that holiday spending online will be up from last year by about 7%. That’s no match for the wild acceleration that ecommerce saw during the pandemic months, but it’s growth and growth is good. Growth is particularly good against a backdrop of stories about inflation-weary consumers and concern over wage growth and the job market in general.

      The contradiction between positive growth projections and the gloomy outlook from consumers underscores the idea that assessing financial and economic numbers is a game of averages. While Signifyd is projecting a 7% increase in ecommerce sales in Q4, some retail verticals will do much better than that while others will experience “negative growth” — a polite way of saying their sales won’t even match last year’s levels.

      Grocery, apparel and electronics will all finish the quarter above the industry growth average. Grocery will lead the pack as it has consistently, with sales rising 20% over the final quarter of 2023. Fashion and apparel will be up 12% from last holiday season and electronics will be 8% higher, according to Signifyd projections.

      Projected holiday season spending by vertical – 2024 vs. 2023

       

      Grocery	+20%
      Fashion and apparel	+12%
      Electronics	+8%
      Leisure and outdoor	+4%
      Luxury goods	+4%
      Beauty and cosmetics	0%
      Auto parts	-3%
      Home goods	-3%
      Alcohol	-4%

      Luxury goods and leisure and outdoor retailers will see year-over-year holiday sales growth below the industry average — both rising 4% over 2023. No doubt beauty and cosmetics, auto parts, home goods and alcohol would take that modest improvement, given that each will see sales lower than the fourth quarter of 2023, according to Signifyd’s analysis.

      Basing 2025 ecommerce predictions on the projected strong, but hardly stunning, holiday season is a treacherous business. So many factors drive the economy — not the least among them consumer confidence — that it can be hard to say confidently how it will all shake out.

      Still, a number of signs indicate that consumers will be willing to spend online at higher rates than they did in 2024. The stock market is up more than 20% for the year at this writing. It turns out when the stock market is performing well, consumers tend to spend more.

      A JPMorgan Chase study concluded that consumer spending increases after a rise in stock prices — driven by “spending bursts” on credit cards. For every 10% rise in stock prices, Chase concluded, credit card spending increases by about 1%.

      Of course, the stock market is notoriously volatile and plenty of fortunes have been lost by people misreading it. But overall the market is moving in the right direction as 2024 closes out and the Chase study describes a spending bounce that lasts about four months after a jump in stock prices.

      Consumers’ confidence — as well as their ability to borrow — will also be buoyed by the Federal Reserve’s recent and coming interest rate cuts.

      All that to say that taken together, when it comes to consumer spending, the numbers are pointing in a positive direction for 2025.

      3. Yes, consumers will continue to spend, but they will be thoughtful about how they are spending. 

      As we said, value-seeking consumers are here to stay, which means the trends of trading down and hunting for discounts will also persist well into the new year. Holiday shoppers are embracing discounts in a bigger way than they did in 2023, when discounts were quite the rage.

      In the first two weeks of the holiday shopping season, online sales accompanied by a discount code were up 22% over the same period in 2023, according to Signifyd data. In all, consumers took advantage of discounts on one-third of the orders they placed at the beginning of the season.

      It’s a trend that appears to be gaining momentum and so it informs our 2025 ecommerce predictions. During the 2023 holiday season, online shoppers turned to discounts on 24% of their orders. That marked a 20% increase over the previous holiday season.

      The trend leaves retailers navigating a maddening balance: How to meet consumers’ expectations for great deals while avoiding becoming the winner in a race to the bottom on price.

      The conundrum calls for creativity. Online merchants should explore ways to provide value beyond discounting prices. For instance:

      • Can you build your brand into a trusted expert in your space? Think of an electronics brand or an outdoor goods retailer providing ways to get the most out of the gadgets and equipment they sell. Or a fashion merchant suggesting articles of clothing that can be paired in a variety of ways to create a lineup of different outfits. What about a grocer compiling a range of recipes including those fit for a special occasion and those meant to stretch a monthly food budget?
      • Does launching or expanding your inventory of private-label brands make sense for your business? The trend toward trading down indicates that consumers are looking for less expensive alternatives for non-discretionary items and for price points that make discretionary purchases possible.
      • Add a twist to the private-label strategy. Are you able to offer a product or products that the competition — big box or otherwise — can’t? Maybe it’s by being a must-have brand. Maybe it’s a design that makes your travel mug or hoodie or patio chair the “it” item for those who buy travel mugs or hoodies or patio chairs.

      4. The rise of the thoughtfully spending consumer will be especially significant in the grocery category.

      Online grocery sales have been growing at a rapid rate year over year. In October, the first month of the holiday season, sales were up 20% over October 2023. Retail analysts, including Forrester’s Sucharita Kodali, have noted that consumers have had it with high prices in the grocery aisles and on grocery sites.

      That means value-seeking consumers will likely double-down on their embrace of private-label brands while seeking other ways to save money on the food they buy. Those efforts are likely to put pressure on margins for grocery merchants.

      That makes the moves recommended for merchants in general, all the more important for the grocery category. Become more than a supplier for consumers. Become a helpful expert in your field. Focus on your private label strategy and consider whether you can expand your inventory of private label goods. Offer what others don’t: a better curbside pick-up experience, and in-store experiences like wine tastings or cooking demos, for example.

      5. With the presidential election settled, consumers will trade short-term uncertainty for long-term uncertainty. 

      Some had feared uncertainty leading up to the quadrennial presidential election and disputes about its outcome would freeze consumer spending for weeks or even months. But the election produced a clear winner and a traditional concession the day after the election, which should prove a plus for consumer spending.

      In the short term, the election did cause a dip in ecommerce sales, according to Signifyd data. While sales the week before the election increased 6.8% over the previous year and increased by double-digit percentages the weekend before Election Day — they slowed beginning the Monday before the election.

      On election eve, sales increased only 5% over the previous year and on Election Day, sales fell 2% year over year. With the election settled, sales headed back to positive territory compared to a year ago.

      But now the question of who will be president has been replaced by what will the incoming president do. President-elect Donald Trump has promised to enact significant tariffs on all products imported into the United States — 10% to 20% on most items and 60% on products arriving from China.

      Such added fees are likely to be passed on to consumers at least in part, causing higher prices and fueling inflation. Basing 2025 ecommerce predictions on the Trump administration agenda is tricky.

      First, enacting tariffs takes time and so the effects won’t be seen even once Trump is sworn in. Second, while higher prices might slow consumer spending, the threat of higher prices in the future might spur spending.

      One other side note: This holiday season China mega-marketplaces like Temu and others will play a bigger role than ever. The growth of these low-cost options will attract the attention of value-oriented shoppers. That growth has already attracted the attention politicians and government officials.

      So a bonus prediction: The Trump administration will act in 2025 to end or modify the so-called de minimis exemption, which is a pillar of mega-marketplaces’ business plans. The exemption applies to imports valued at less than $800 and it means they can come into the U.S. without duties and with a streamlined U.S. Customs process.

      Eliminating the exemption would mean fulfillment would take significantly longer and prices would be considerably higher for the goods purchased on the marketplaces. Trump has a long list of changes he’s pledged to make. It’s hard to know where de minimis is on his list.

      For now the biggest effect of the settled election is more uncertainty, which could cause consumers to throttle back spending. Time will tell.

      6. Personalization online will be a must-have through the entire buying journey.

      Ecommerce leaders have been talking about personalization forever. The main focus, however, has been on discovery — marketing and merchandising — drawing organic searchers to your website, presenting them with products they are interested in and likely to buy.

      That will continue to be important in 2025, if also disrupted by the growth of generative AI and its rapidly growing role in organic search. But comprehensive personalization will increasingly become a pillar for online retailers’ success.

      Knowing your customers will be an avenue to building trust — trust that customers are who they say they are and that when they order something or return something, that they are behaving honestly. For consumers, trust means knowing a merchant will provide the total experience a customer is looking for. That’s everything from providing relevant recommendations, high-quality products, quick and easy checkout, seamless returns and knowledgeable customer support.

      To get that right, personalization needs to extend to the payment stage of the buying process and beyond. Consumers have come to expect that they will be able to pay by the method they prefer, whether that’s a credit card or debit card; whether that’s a digital wallet or buy now, pay later. Successful retailers will lead with that choice at checkout. The best might ultimately lead with different payment methods for the same consumer depending on the specific context of the purchase.

      Genuine personalization needs to be baked into the post-purchase experience, too. Merchants need to understand whether the customer requesting a refund or a return is a known and loyal customer who should receive an instant refund or an unknown customer or even a customer with a sketchy return history whose request requires more scrutiny before a refund or store credit is issued.

      7. Online merchants’ struggle to contain the cost and disruption of returns will intensify.

      Heading into the holiday season, Boohoo-owned PrettyLittleThing reversed itself on returns. After deciding earlier in the year to charge a fee (about $2.60) for returns, the company said “never mind” in September.

      PLT, as it’s known, was hardly the first to charge a fee for online returns, nor was it the first to decide that instituting the fee wasn’t such a good idea. In the last year or so, H&M, New Look and Uniqlo have announced charges for some online returns. Even Amazon decided to charge a $1 return fee to items returned to a UPS store rather than to an Amazon-affiliated dropoff point if the dropoff point was closer to the customer’s home than the UPS outlet. In fact, in December, returns logistics provider Happy Returns reported that 81% of merchants charged for some returns methods, according to CBS News.

      As we move from the 2024 holiday season to the 2025 holiday-gift-return season, look for more of the mind-boggling contradiction of some retailers announcing they will charge for returns while others announce they are reversing their decisions to charge for returns.

      The truth is, returns put online merchants in a bind. They are margin crushers, costing ecommerce merchants $247 billion in 2023, according to the National Retail Federation. But they are also a part of the shopping experience that consumers hold dear.

      More than three-quarters of European consumers surveyed for Signifyd said a merchant’s return policies were fairly or very important in their decision about where to shop online. Moreover, 57% said they’d be less likely to shop at a retailer that charged for online returns. The results echoed answers from a 2022 Signifyd survey of U.S. customers —  62% said they’d be likely to shop more from a brand that offered a good return experience; 65% said they’d be less likely to buy from a brand that offers a bad return experience.

      As 2024 closes out, expect new ideas around returns to capture more attention as the industry searches for a way to tame the cost of returns, including fraudulent and abusive returns, which Signifyd data shows have doubled as a portion of all online returns between 2023 and 2024.
      

      

       

      Perhaps the safest among 2025 ecommerce predictions is that there will be challenges ahead. Consumers will continue to be willing to spend, but they will expect good deals and appreciable value, whether that’s through pricing or differentiated products and more personalized services. Returns will be a growing concern for merchants, but a significant number will move closer to finding a way to mitigate returns’ effect on the bottom line.

      Along with the challenges, of course, will come new opportunities — opportunities to better serve customers while increasing sales and longer-term customer lifetime value. One safe prediction? Merchants who seize those opportunities will be in for a very good 2025.

      Photo by Getty Images

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