Saturday 28 November 2015 2:45 pm

Black Friday: Online shopping rose 270 per cent compared to a normal day

An analysis of the 24 hour period of Black Friday found a 270 per cent increase in e-commerce activity compared to a normal day.

At some time periods in the day, such as between midnight and 1am, there was a mammoth 660 per cent increase in online activity using a normal day, in this case Friday 20 November (a week before Black Friday), as the benchmark.

Using data from Black Friday last year and comparing it to this year's shopping extravaganza, PCA Predict also found that there is a growing trend of consumers going online to do their shopping.

In fact, there was a 16 per cent increase in consumers going online this year, compared to last year, while "high streets recorded a fall in shoppers this year".

There was also a trend in the device usage over the day. "While the hours of midnight to 7am marked the first time smartphones outranked desktops, there was a shift as people headed into work which saw desktop usage increase and take the lead when shoppers were in the office resulting it being the major device of choice overall," PCA Predict said.

Testament to the popularity of Black Friday, following on to Cyber Monday, analysts have predicted that the UK will spend more than £3bn across the four day period.