It is 11:48 on Thanksgiving night, and the TV you have watched for three weeks now wears a red banner: 40% off. The crossed-out price reads $899. The tag under the banner reads $749. You try the division in your head and lose track around the second digit.
Black Friday lands on November 27 this year, and Cyber Monday follows on November 30. Adobe expects US shoppers to spend $275.1 billion online between November 1 and December 31, up 6.7% from last season. Two checks sort a real deal from a banner: the math and the price history. Both take about two minutes.
Adobe's forecast for 2026
Adobe published its holiday forecast on September 28, 2026. Cyber Week, the five days from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday, should bring in $47.5 billion online, or 17.3% of the season. Cyber Monday leads at $15.1 billion and Black Friday follows at $12.9 billion, up 9.2%. Adobe says Black Friday is growing faster because it carries the biggest discounts in several categories. The full release sits on Adobe's newsroom.
Discounts climb through the season. Adobe expects up to 14% off listed prices at the start of November, up to 21% in the days before Thanksgiving and up to 30% during Cyber Week, then 10% to 15% through December. Each up-to figure is the peak for the best category in that window.
- On Cyber Monday, November 30, Adobe expects the deepest electronics discounts, up to 30%, and the deepest computer discounts, up to 23%.
- On Black Friday, November 27, TVs peak at 23%, toys at 29%, apparel at 23%, appliances at 18% and furniture at 18%.
- On Thanksgiving, November 26, sporting goods peak at 19%.
I read "up to 30%" as a ceiling for the best category on the best day. Appliances and furniture peak at 18% in Adobe's forecast, so a storewide "30% off" banner deserves a look at the fine print.
October already pulled some of the rush forward. Adobe expects $95.8 billion in online spending for the month, up 8%. Prime Day on October 6 and 7 drew about $9.9 billion and peaked at 19% off, below the 30% Adobe expects in Cyber Week.
The math behind a percent off
The sale price is the list price times one minus the discount. A TV listed at $899 with 23% off costs $899 times 0.77, which is $692.23. The Discount Calculator does that in one step and shows how much you save.
Run it backward on the banner from the opening. A TV that drops from $899 to $749 is 16.7% off, because $150 divided by $899 is 0.167. The banner said 40%. The Percentage Calculator handles this direction with its percentage change mode. If a banner and a tag disagree, trust the tag.
Small jumps in the discount hide bigger jumps in the price. Moving from 20% off to 30% off sounds like a 10% drop. The price falls from 80% of list to 70% of list, which is a 12.5% drop. An "up to 50% off" banner needs one item at 50% off to qualify, and the tag on the item you want carries the number that counts.
Stacked coupons do not add up
Two percentage discounts multiply. A 30% sale plus an extra 20% coupon leaves you paying 70% of 80% of the price, which is 56%. The real discount is 44%. On a $200 item, $200 times 0.70 is $140, and $140 times 0.80 is $112. You save $88.
Dollar coupons depend on the order. Take a $120 item with 30% off and a $20 coupon. Apply the percent first and you pay $120 times 0.70 minus $20, which is $64. Apply the coupon first and you pay $100 times 0.70, which is $70. The checkout page decides the order, so compare the final total in your cart.
Spend-and-save offers shrink as the cart grows. "Save $20 when you spend $100" is 20% off at $100. At $160 it is 12.5%.
Compare two deals on the same item
Sticker prices mislead when the discounts differ. Store A lists a jacket at $80 with 30% off, so you pay $56. Store B lists the same jacket at $65 with 10% off, so you pay $58.50. The higher list price wins by $2.50. Run both through the Discount Calculator and compare the final prices and skip the percentages. Subtract any gift card or loyalty credit from the final price in the same way before you compare.
Set a target price before the sale
Decide what you will pay before the banners start. Say you want that $899 TV for $700. The discount you need is $199 divided by $899, which is 22.1%. Adobe has TVs peaking at 23% on Black Friday, which leaves a margin of less than one point. The target needs the best price of the season, so write the number down before you open a store tab and treat any price above it as a no.
Shipping and unit prices
Shipping can erase a discount. A $200 item on sale for $150 with $15 of shipping costs $165, which is 17.5% off the list price. The banner said 25%.
Free-shipping thresholds work the same way. A $28 cart with $6 of shipping needs a $7 item to reach a $35 threshold. If you would not buy that item anyway, you spend $7 to save $6.
Unit prices expose pack-size games. A 12 oz bag at $5.49 costs about 45.8 cents an ounce. A 340 g bag at $6.99 sounds close, but 340 grams is 11.99 ounces, so it costs 58.3 cents an ounce. The Unit Converter turns grams, ounces and pounds into one unit so you can compare.
Spotting a fake original price
The FTC's Guides Against Deceptive Pricing set the rule for a crossed-out price. A former price has to be the actual, bona fide price the store charged the public on a regular basis for a substantial period of time. An artificial, inflated price set so a later cut looks large makes the bargain false. The text is in 16 CFR Part 233.
The guides describe how the FTC reads the law, and they do not check any price for you. For Amazon items, the free CamelCamelCamel and Keepa charts show a price history, so you can see whether the "was" price ever appeared. For other stores, write down the price of anything over $100 now and compare it on November 27.
A QR code on a flyer, a sticker or a text that promises a deal belongs in the same bucket. Type the store's address into your browser and skip the scan. The QR code scam guide explains how scammers place fake stickers over real codes.
Buy now, pay later changes when you pay
Adobe expects buy now, pay later to drive $21.3 billion in November and December, including $1.09 billion on Cyber Monday and $807 million on Black Friday. Installments change when the money leaves your account and leave the price of the item alone. Compare the total cost with any interest or fees included, and run the Discount Calculator on the full price. The free tools roundup lists the other money calculators on the site.
Common questions
It depends on the category. Adobe expects the deepest discounts on TVs, toys, apparel, appliances and furniture on Black Friday, November 27. Electronics and computers peak on Cyber Monday, November 30, and sporting goods peak on Thanksgiving, November 26.
No. The two discounts multiply. You pay 70% of the price, then 80% of that, which is 56% of the original price. The real discount is 44%.
The retailer decides, and the order changes your total. On a $120 item with 30% off and a $20 coupon, a percent-first checkout gives $64 and a coupon-first checkout gives $70. Compare the final total in your cart before you pay.
It should be. The FTC's Guides Against Deceptive Pricing say a former price has to be the actual price the store charged the public on a regular basis for a substantial period of time. The guides describe how the FTC reads the law and they do not check any tag for you, so a price history or a second store is your best test.
Adobe's discount figures measure online prices at US retail sites. A store flyer can carry different prices, so compare the final total for the same item in both places.
No. It changes when you pay and leaves the price of the item alone. Compare the total cost with any interest or fees included, and run the discount math on the full price.
No. The Discount Calculator does its math in your browser. It uploads nothing and saves nothing.