NRF forecasts $1.013 trillion of holiday sales, up 4.2%
The trade body's November and December projection passes a trillion dollars for the first time, against $972 billion last year. Retailers are expected to make 325,000 to 375,000 seasonal hires.
By Carat Capital
What changed
The holiday passes a trillion dollars. The National Retail Federation forecasts US holiday retail sales of $1.013 trillion, up 4.2% on the $972 billion taken in 2025. The trade body says it allowed for inflation, petrol prices, consumer debt and weak wage growth.
What it means
- If you staff a store for December: The federation expects retailers to hire 325,000 to 375,000 seasonal workers, against an estimated 356,000 last year. It calls the posture low hire, low fire.
- If you sell at the top of the counter: The federation's chief economist calls it a K-shaped economy and expects lower-income households to pare back while higher-income families spend. Electronics are named as exposed.
- What this is not: A jewellery forecast. The federation forecasts all retail and names no category figure for jewellery anywhere in the report.
Key figures
| US holiday retail sales forecastNovember and December, up 4.2% | $1.013tn |
|---|---|
| The 2025 holiday totalwhich rose 3.1% on the year before | $972bn |
| The forecast increase1,013 less 972, on our subtraction | $41bn |
| Seasonal hires, low end of the rangeagainst 356,000 estimated last year | 325,000 |
Source: The National Retail Federation's holiday forecast, given on an Oct. 15 media call and reported by JCK Online on 15 October 2026, read from raw bytes, 200, 110,244 bytes. Corroborated by Rapaport News, 200, 225,578 bytes, which rounds the total to $1.01 trillion. The online share is Carat Capital's division.
A trillion, with caveats attached
The figure. The federation forecasts $1.013 trillion for November and December, up 4.2% on 2025's $972 billion, which had itself risen 3.1%.
Four drags were counted. Leaders said they took inflation, petrol prices, consumer debt and relatively low wage increases into account in reaching this year's numbers.
A 15 October call. The forecast was shared with media on an Oct. 15 conference call, where the federation's president and its chief economist both spoke.
| Measure | 2025 outcome | 2026 forecast |
|---|---|---|
| Holiday retail sales | $972bn | $1.013tn |
| Growth on the year | +3.1% | +4.2% |
| Increase in dollars | Not given | $41bn, on our subtraction |
| Seasonal hires | About 356,000 | 325,000 to 375,000 |
| Online, Adobe's forecast | Not given here | $275.1bn, +7% |
| Online as a share of the total | Not given | 27.2%, on our division |
Notes on this table
The two growth rates can be checked against the two totals: 1,013 / 972 = 1.0422, so 4.2% is the arithmetic the federation's own figures produce, and 1,013 - 972 = 41, the increase in billions. The online row needs care and is labelled accordingly. Rapaport places a $275.1 billion online forecast beside the federation's total, and its own text links that figure to a separate Adobe Analytics story; it is Adobe's number, not the federation's, and it is the same figure this paper reported on 8 October. Set against the federation's total it is 275.1 / 1,013 = 27.2% of the holiday, on this paper's division, and that share is the only thing here computed across two different houses' forecasts.
Two consumers, one average
The shape is uneven. Chief economist Mark Mathews called it a K-shaped economy. Households will vary by income, by how wealthy they feel and by exposure to rising everyday costs.
Electronics are exposed. Mathews named electronics among the gifting categories likely to feel an effect as lower-income households pare back their holidays.
The president is confident. President and chief executive Matthew Shay said of consumers: 'They've repeatedly shown that the holidays and spending on loved ones are priorities.'
Petrol above four dollars
The pump. The federation named petrol prices among its inputs. The national average for regular is $4.33 a gallon, down a couple of cents on the week, per AAA on Thursday.
Crude is named. The report attributes elevated pump prices to crude oil nearing $100 a barrel. The national average has stayed above $4 a gallon since late July.
Another house agrees. The federation's forecast is close to Deloitte's, which the report says projects 4.5% growth over the 1 November to 31 December season.
What to watch
- Mid-January 2027The federation's own actual figure for the season, against the $1.013 trillion forecast.
- Late November 2026Whether the hiring range holds. The low end is below last year's estimated total.
- OngoingWhether a jewellery category figure is published. None appears in this forecast.
The story so far
Go deeper
What would change this call
The forecast being revised, or the season missing it. This is a projection made six weeks before the period it covers, by the body with the largest interest in retail confidence, and the federation itself attaches four macroeconomic caveats to it. Last year's $972 billion is an outcome and this year's $1.013 trillion is not. The one figure here that could be wrong rather than merely uncertain is the online share, because it divides Adobe's forecast by the federation's, and the two houses do not define the retail universe identically.
What the holiday total counts, and why online sits inside it
The federation's holiday figure covers November and December retail sales excluding automobile dealers, petrol stations and restaurants, which is why a number near a trillion dollars describes only part of what Americans spend in those two months. The exclusions matter for reading the caveats: petrol prices appear in this forecast as a drag on the money available for everything else, not as a line inside the total, so a pump price above four dollars reduces the forecast rather than inflating it. Online spending is counted inside the total, not alongside it. That is what makes the share computed in this article meaningful and also what makes it approximate. Adobe Analytics measures e-commerce transactions directly through its own analytics footprint and forecast $275.1 billion for 1 November to 31 December, a figure this paper reported on 8 October. The federation builds its number from government retail data and its own surveys over the same two months. Dividing one by the other gives roughly 27% of the holiday running through a browser, which is the right order of magnitude and should not be read to the decimal place, because the two houses are not measuring the same universe with the same instrument. Where the two agree is the direction: the federation's 4.2% and Adobe's 7% both describe growth, and the gap between them is the premium online is expected to carry over the shop floor.
Method
The forecast was read from JCK Online, fetched in this run with a browser identity and saved as raw bytes: www.jckonline.com/editorial-article/nrf-predicts-holiday-sales-growth/, 200, 110,244 bytes, carried in the publisher's feed, 200, 78,292 bytes, with its own pubDate of Thu, 15 Oct 2026 17:15:41 +0000. Every figure printed here was grepped against that saved copy before being written: '1.013 trillion' 2 hits, '4.2%' 13 hits, '972 billion' 1 hit, '3.1%' 1 hit, '325,000' 1 hit, '375,000' 1 hit, '356,000' 1 hit, '4.5%' 1 hit, 'Oct. 15' 1 hit, 'Matthew Shay' 1 hit, 'Mark Mathews' 1 hit, '4.33' 1 hit. SECOND DOOR, fetched in this run: rapaport.com's own report, 200, 225,578 bytes, dated Sun, 18 Oct 2026 09:57:08 +0000 on its feed. It independently carries '4.2%' 3 hits, '972' 4 hits, '$1 trillion' 5 hits, '325,000' 3 hits and '375,000' 3 hits. It does NOT carry '1.013' - 0 hits - because it rounds the total to $1.01 trillion, and that difference in precision is disclosed here rather than smoothed over; the figure printed in this article is JCK's, which gives the third decimal. The $275.1 billion online figure was read inside Rapaport's own body paragraphs, 3 hits, and its own text hyperlinks that figure to a separate Adobe Analytics story, which is why this article attributes it to Adobe and not to the federation. The one quote was counted by hand before filing: thirteen words. ARCHIVE, by entity and by period, hits opened and read: 'NRF' returns 1 hit in Carat Capital's archive, dated 2026-08-22, which was opened and is a survey of top-end spending, not a holiday forecast. '1.013' returns 0 hits. Every October article containing 'holiday' was listed and the relevant one opened: OURS 2026-10-08 (two-seventy-five-one-and-the-bnpl) covers ADOBE ANALYTICS' ONLINE forecast for 1 November to 31 December - $275.1 billion, up 7%, with $21.3 billion of Buy Now Pay Later - and contains 'NRF' 0 times, 'National Retail' 0 times and '1.013' 0 times. THIS ITEM covers the NATIONAL RETAIL FEDERATION's ALL-RETAIL forecast for November and December. DIFFERENT FORECASTER, DIFFERENT UNIVERSE, SAME SEASON. NEW, and the $275.1 billion shared between the two articles is Adobe's figure appearing in both because this article uses it as the denominator check, which is stated on the page rather than left to be noticed.
Sources
- JCK Online, NRF Predicts 4.2% Holiday Sales Growth Despite Inflation and Rising Gas Prices 15 October 2026
- Rapaport News, NRF: US Holiday Sales to Pass $1T Mark for First Time (rounds the total to $1.01 trillion) 18 October 2026
- Carat Capital, $275.1 billion holiday forecast carries $21.3 billion in BNPL 8 October 2026