Do not judge December against last December. Adobe's forecast shows December online sales down 3.5% and November up 17.8%, and its forecast document attributes much of the swing to Cyber Monday moving from December 1, 2025 to November 30, 2026. If you plan December from last year's month total, you will probably over-fund it. Plan from event days, shipping dates and your own data instead.
What does Adobe forecast for December 2026?
Adobe forecasts $275.1 billion in US online holiday sales for November 1 to December 31, up 6.7%, per its September 28 release. Its forecast document splits the months:
- November: $145.1 billion, up 17.8%, with much of the rise attributed to Cyber Monday moving into the month.
- December: down 3.5%, also due to calendar effects.
- Discounts: easing to roughly 10% to 15% in December, after up to 30% in Cyber Week.
Our arithmetic: $275.1 billion minus $145.1 billion leaves about $130 billion for December. Working back from Adobe's growth rates, last December was roughly $135 billion. These are forecasts of US online retail only.
One caution. A reviewer at PPC Land notes that Adobe's discount chart does not fully support the December discount range. Treat it as a rough guide.
Why can't you compare December to last year?
Because one big day changed months. Last year Cyber Monday fell on December 1, so it sat inside last December. This year it is November 30. A like-for-like comparison of December totals compares a month with Cyber Monday against one without.
That matters in two ways. If your December revenue is down against last year, part of that is the calendar. And if you set December budgets to match last year's spend, you may pay for demand that has already happened.
Compare days with days. Last year's first week of December includes a Cyber Monday. This year's does not.
How do Meta's phases fit December?
Per Social Media Today's summary of Meta's holiday guides, Meta calls December the Gifting phase and late December into the new year the Fresh Start phase. We could not open Meta's own pages, so this is second-hand.
Our reading, as a planning frame:
- Early December: gift shoppers, with deadlines driven by delivery dates.
- Mid December: the last days for standard shipping. We have no source for carrier cutoffs, so check yours.
- Late December: a change in mindset, from gifts for others to purchases for yourself, returns and new-year plans.
For the full phase calendar, see Meta Ads and AI agents: the complete guide.
What should a December plan include?
This section is our opinion.
1. A debrief on Tuesday, December 1. Write down what Cyber Week did to your numbers before you plan the month. Include spend, orders, cost per order and anything that broke.
2. A reset of goals. Black Friday goals (volume, offers) are not December goals (gift timing, margin). Rewrite them.
3. A budget by week. Split December into weeks, not one number. Give each week a purpose: early gifts, last standard-shipping days, last-minute, and after Christmas.
4. A creative change. Move from "deal" to "gift" language. Check that offers, prices and delivery promises are current.
5. A stock and shipping check. Pause ads for items that will not arrive in time. Update delivery messages in ads and on the site.
6. A holdout or baseline. Keep a comparison so you can tell whether December spend is adding sales. See our incrementality testing guide.
7. A stop rule. Decide the cost per sale at which you cut, and who decides. Peak-day noise fades, but December still has quiet weeks where a loose budget drifts.
What should you do about returns and the new year?
This section is our opinion. We found no source on 2026 return rates, so we do not give a number. The point is process.
Returns lag. A sale on Black Friday can come back in December, and revenue you counted in November may shrink. When you read your Cyber Week results on December 1, mark them as preliminary and look again in mid-January, when returns have mostly settled.
For the new year, decide in advance whether you will keep spending into January and at what level. Late December is the Fresh Start phase in Meta's framing, and a plan with no January line often drifts into a default budget nobody chose. Write the January budget and goal before December ends.
How should agencies talk to clients about December?
Tell clients early that December will not look like last December because of the calendar shift, and show them Adobe's November and December figures to explain why. Agree the comparison method in writing: event days against event days, and backend orders as the source of truth.
Share the debrief from December 1 within a week, with what worked, what broke and what changes in December. Clients forgive a rough Cyber Week more readily than a surprise in the monthly report.
How do you read December results?
Use your own backend orders as the source of truth. Platform-reported results are noisy in December for the same reasons as in November. Our posts on reading cross-platform numbers and on Q4 and BFCM pacing cover how to keep one source of truth and how to pace across the quarter.
If you have run into a measurement change this month, such as the Meta Pixel's on-device conversion setting that PPC Land says starts November 12, annotate it on every chart. December will include effects from both the calendar and the measurement change.
What are the limits of this plan?
- It rests on a forecast. Adobe publishes actuals after the event, and they may differ.
- It is US online retail. Other markets and B2B behave differently.
- We have no shipping data. Delivery cutoffs vary by carrier and country. Check them.
- Your category may differ. Adobe's figures are averages.
What should you do next?
Schedule a 45-minute debrief for Tuesday, December 1, and write December's weekly goals in it. If you run changes through Adlyse, each approved change ships with a hypothesis and is graded improved, hurt or neutral. Weekly goals are hypotheses, so state them before the spend.
