Cyber Monday — Close-up of a keyboard key labeled 'Sale!' in red cursive text

Cyber Monday

2005eventclassic

Published August 17, 2026

Cyber Monday is the US online shopping event held the Monday after Thanksgiving, pitched in 2005 by executives at Shop.org to give holiday shoppers an extension of Black Friday sales on the web. From a $608 million debut in 2006 it grew into one of the largest single-day e-commerce events on record, topping $1.7 billion in desktop sales by 2013.

consumer culture memes seasonal memes annual tradition memes advertising memes

Overview

Cyber Monday is the name given to the Monday after US Thanksgiving, when online retailers push aggressive holiday discounts aimed at shoppers logging back on after the long weekend3. It sits opposite Black Friday, the in-store shopping rush the day after Thanksgiving, and is now observed by big-box chains, dedicated e-commerce brands, and small independent sellers alike.

The event is US in origin, but similar Cyber Monday promotions run in Canada, the UK, and other markets, and retailers typically stretch pricing across the full weekend either side of it. Consumer tech outlets like The Verge treat the day as a second wave of holiday deals for shoppers who missed early Black Friday pricing or held out for steeper discounts9.

Origin & Background

Platform
Shop.org press release / New York Times (first print use)
Creator
Ellen Davis
Date
2005

The label was pitched in November 2005 by executives at Shop.org, the digital commerce division of the National Retail Federation, to package the yearly spike in online orders that arrived when workers returned from Thanksgiving weekend3. Ellen Davis, then Senior Vice President of the NRF, is credited with coining the term in a Shop.org press release titled "Cyber Monday Quickly Becoming One of the Biggest Online Shopping Days of the Year," dated November 21, 2005.

According to the etymology tracker Word Spy, the earliest known print use of the neologism appeared two days earlier, in the New York Times article "Ready, Aim, Shop" published November 19, 20053.

How It Spread

The label started tracking real money by year two. Comscore reported that Cyber Monday 2006 pulled in $608 million in US online retail spending, up 26 percent over the equivalent day in 2005 and the first single day in e-commerce history to break the $600 million mark2. Shop.org's promotional hub CyberMonday.com drew roughly 300,000 US visitors that day, on par with a leading price-comparison shopping engine's average daily traffic.

Growth kept stacking year over year. Cyber Monday 2007 brought in $733 million, then a season-high day for online holiday spending4. The 2008 edition climbed to $846 million despite a wider retail slump, ranking second only to Green Monday 2007 at that point5. Cyber Monday 2009 matched the all-time single-day record of $887 million set on December 9, 2008, driven by a 6 percent jump in online buyers to 8.7 million6.

The 2010s pushed the numbers into ten figures. Cyber Monday first cleared the billion-dollar mark in 2010, then hit $1.25 billion in 20117 and $1.46 billion in 20128, both flagged by Comscore as the heaviest online spending days recorded at their time. In 2013 desktop spending on Cyber Monday reached $1.735 billion, an 18 percent year-over-year jump1. Retailers by that point were bleeding Cyber Monday deals into the Thanksgiving weekend, and the full five-day window from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday brought in $5.3 billion online1.

How to Use This Meme

Retailers typically launch dedicated Cyber Monday landing pages, email blasts, and app push notifications ahead of the Monday after US Thanksgiving, offering time-limited discounts on electronics, apparel, and gifts9. A common convention among shoppers is to compare prices against the previous weekend's Black Friday deals and place orders from work desktops or mobile devices, a behavior Comscore identified early when it found 45.5 percent of holiday-season online spending in November 2007 came from work locations, edging out home shopping at 44.1 percent4.

Cultural Impact

Comscore built annual holiday coverage around Cyber Monday, publishing headline year-over-year growth numbers for the day every December1. Consumer tech outlets including The Verge publish Cyber Monday deal roundups every season, treating it as an editorial event on par with product launches9. The naming pattern also seeded related retail dates such as Green Monday, the December shopping day that briefly held the single-day online spending record in 2007 with $881 million, before Cyber Monday reclaimed the top spot in 200956.

Fun Facts

Cyber Monday 2006 was the first single day in US e-commerce history to cross $600 million in retail sales, according to Comscore2.

Shop.org ran a promotional hub called CyberMonday.com that drew about 300,000 US visitors on the first namesake day in 2006, roughly the same daily traffic as PriceGrabber.com at the time2.

For the 2007 season, shopping from work slightly outpaced shopping from home, at 45.5 percent versus 44.1 percent of total online holiday spending4.

Cyber Monday 2009 tied the all-time single-day online spending record of $887 million originally set on December 9, 20086.

The 2013 Thanksgiving-through-Cyber-Monday five-day window brought in $5.3 billion in desktop e-commerce sales, up 22 percent versus the prior year1.

Derivatives & Variations

Green Monday, the second Monday of December shopping event that briefly held the all-time single-day online spending record with $881 million in 2007[5].

Frequently Asked Questions