E-commerce is no longer just a channel—it’s the backbone of modern retail. As the Wall Street Journal reported on Dec. 3, online sales hit 16.1% of total U.S. retail in 2024, up from 15.3% the previous year. In high-demand holiday categories like electronics and toys, penetration is even higher. At the same time, physical store traffic continues to slip—down 2.1% on Black Friday—while online spending surged to $11.8 billion the day after Thanksgiving, a 9.1% jump year over year.

This shift comes with a new reality: when shoppers rely on the internet, any technical failure can instantly ripple across millions of buyers. We saw that earlier this year, when issues at Amazon disrupted web services nationwide. Moments like that underscore an uncomfortable truth: reliability isn’t optional; it’s existential. And it’s exactly why retailers choose partners like Algolia to keep their digital storefronts fast, stable, and conversion-ready when it matters most.

Peak season is no longer a weekend... it’s a marathon

Forget the old playbook where Black Friday and Cyber Monday were two explosive, but contained commercial events. Today’s reality is very different: peak retail has stretched from a frantic weekend sprint into a multi-month marathon running from early November through January.

Retailers now launch holiday promotions weeks before Black Friday, and consumers have fully adapted. Shoppers arrive earlier, search earlier, compare earlier, and they keep going long after Cyber Monday wraps. What used to be a single crescendo has become a rolling wave of sustained high-intent traffic. And during this short, intense Black Friday through Cyber Monday period, shoppers generated 33.5 billion searches (a 13% year-over-year increase) on retail sites that were ably supported by Algolia’s AI Retrieval platform.

Black Friday still delivers the biggest single-day surge, but it’s no longer the whole story. In the days leading up to it, we now see near-peak QPS (queries per second) as retailers front-load discounts and shoppers pounce on early deals. The traditional “rush” has expanded into a high-volume runway, not a short sprint. In November alone, Algolia supported a staggering 184 billion total queries, up 61% from last year, across global retail sites.

Cyber Monday, once considered the finish line, now simply extends the curve. Online shopping continues throughout December as consumers rely on AI tools, mobile apps, and broader digital discovery. The momentum doesn’t stop there—gift cards, returns, and renewed browsing habits continue to drive traffic well into January.

This marathon-like season places new demands on retail systems:

• Longer periods of elevated traffic

• More unpredictable spikes driven by flash deals, influencers, and AI-assisted discovery

• Shoppers switching fluidly between AI tools and ecommerce sites

• Higher expectations for speed, relevance, and reliability across the entire season

And that’s exactly where infrastructure matters most. Moving from a weekend sprint to a multi-month race raises the stakes for technology. Retailers can’t prepare for just one big surge, they need systems that deliver consistent, ultra-reliable performance across weeks of sustained load and unplanned traffic spikes.

In this new landscape, durable, scalable, high-precision search has become the engine that powers discovery, relevance, and conversion from November kickoff through the January cool-down.

Through all of it, Algolia AI Search delivered >99.999% availability, even during the most extreme traffic spikes. For retailers evaluating whether their search and discovery stack can withstand modern demand—especially in the emerging era of agentic AI—this weekend offered a clear answer.

Below, we break down the biggest trends from this holiday season, what they tell us about shifting consumer behavior, and why search performance plays a direct role in conversion when stakes (and Queries Per Second [QPS]) are at their highest.

Holiday demand hit hard

The week before Black Friday, Algolia traffic surged to 118,374 queries per second (QPS), virtually matching the 119,680 QPS peak on Black Friday itself.

Black Friday maintained its reign as the season’s most intense traffic moment, climbing to 9.3 billion searches in a single day, a 40% YoY increase.

For enterprise retailers, the takeaway is blunt: demand elasticity is accelerating. Flash promotions, early deals, and AI-driven consumer tooling are compressing high-intent traffic into smaller windows. Your infrastructure either scales instantly... or it doesn’t.

What shoppers actually searched for

Search data revealed clear shifts in consumer priorities:

• Pet Products: +81% YoY — biggest breakout category.

• Apparel & Fashion: +51% YoY — strong wardrobe refresh moment.

• Health & Wellness: +41% YoY — continued focus on well-being.

• Home Goods: +16% YoY — steady but moderated growth.

• Luxury Goods: –49% YoY — significant correction from last year’s spike.
   

Consumers aren’t cutting back; they’re buying differently, leaning into value, longevity, practicality, and emotional utility.

That makes relevance mission-critical: when shoppers arrive with specific intent, any friction between their query and the results becomes a direct revenue leak.

AI is reshaping the path to purchase, fast

According to Algolia’s November survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers:

• 48% used AI tools (like ChatGPT or Perplexity) to read reviews and comparisons

• 46% used them to find better prices

• 39% used them for gift inspiration

• Only 23% are ready to purchase directly through an AI tool for now

As consumers embrace AI for discovery, the queries hitting retail sites are becoming more complex, conversational, and open-ended. Retailers need retrieval layers built for that shift.

Perhaps most importantly, 72% of shoppers say a retailer’s ethical use of AI will influence where they buy. Responsible AI isn’t a compliance box—it’s a competitive differentiator.

Peak season stress-tests your stack (Algolia removes the guesswork)

Cyber Weekend remains the toughest annual test for ecommerce systems. A millisecond of latency erodes trust and conversions. A brief outage triggers mass abandonment.

This year’s results show why retailers choose Algolia:

1. Unmatched scalability

Handling 1.75+ trillion queries annually, Algolia absorbs holiday volatility automatically, with no preloading, warming, or engineering gymnastics required.

2. Real-time, high-intent relevance

Hybrid retrieval (combining keyword, vector, and semantic intelligence) ensures shoppers see results aligned with what they mean, not only what they type.

3. Generative & agentic AI that drives revenue

Algolia’s retrieval platform includes generative and agentic capabilities to surface complementary items, support dynamic bundles, and guide shoppers through discovery. These aren’t “nice-to-have” features; they directly lift conversion and average order value (AOV) during the most competitive weekend of the year.

4. Trustworthy performance at extreme scale

99.999% availability isn’t theoretical... it’s battle-tested. Retailers saw consistent, blazing-fast response times even at six-figure QPS loads.

The Bottom line

This Black Friday-Cyber Weekend reinforced a fundamental truth: the retailers winning today are the ones preparing for tomorrow. Tomorrow’s traffic patterns. Tomorrow’s AI-driven shopper journeys. Tomorrow’s expectations for trust and relevance.

Algolia powers that shift at enterprise scale, with enterprise reliability.