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Black Friday Shipping Trends 2024 - 2025
With the slasher-sales, and Christmas right around the corner, Black Friday is one of the busiest times of the year for parcel delivery. For eCommerce sellers, the globally-famous day of shopping is a big opportunity to hook in new customers, and boost sales. With a special focus on the needs of online-store owners, Parcel2Go offers a new insight into Black Friday shipping.
We’ve looked into the UK’s top couriers, how small business owners have benefited this year, and which items are most common for Black Friday shipping.
Read the stats on Black Friday shipping, from 2024 to 2025, so you can be knowledgeable on delivery trends, and available benefits. With our Black Friday breakdown, we can learn about how business shipping changes across the busier periods. All data has been collected from the Parcel2Go Group websites.
16th February 2026
Author: Parcel2Go.com
Most popular courier 2025
The last year has seen a lot of changes in parcel delivery, from new services, to USA tariffs; our team of top couriers have adapted with ease to keep shipping reliable through any uncertainty, especially across the busyness of Black Friday.
The most popular courier of Black Friday 2025 was Evri, with over 150,000 orders across the sale period. This is likely due to their consistent low price point, and range of delivery options, like Drop-off and Evri Collection. Evri’s Door to Door collection service allows sellers to ship from the convenience of their home, with couriers collecting their parcels from their door before seeing through the rest of the delivery process. Offering convenient shipping services like these is why Evri is one of the leading couriers, their wide choice puts sellers in a great position to manage their business in the way that works best.
Evri was also the top courier for Black Friday 2024, with around 130,000 orders for their Drop-off service alone. Evri offers consistently low prices and a range of services to suit all types of business needs, making them one of the most reliable couriers for UK domestic shipping, year after year.
Royal Mail saw an increase in service this year, with around 10,000 more orders than Black Friday week 2024. FedEx Express and Yodel Direct stayed fairly consistent between 2024 and 2025, proving themselves to be safe, consistent couriers.
It’s important to know that your business can rely on simple shipping across peak times of year, and top couriers are providing a variety of services to match different business needs. New sellers should learn from shipping trends in order to choose a reliable courier, and with the use of Parcel2Go’s site, sellers can research available courier services to find one that suits.
Most popular courier services
The most popular services in the lead up to Black Friday 2024 and 2025, were Drop-off services, with around 95,000 orders for Evri Parcelshop alone, each year. With the busyness of Black Friday shipping, it’s likely that businesses opt for Drop-off services out of affordability, and convenience. With thousands of local drop-off points, every business is highly likely to have a local parcelshop, or other drop-off point that they can easily access.
Drop-off services are often some of the most affordable, and offer a lot of freedom for sellers to decide when and where their parcels get shipped. They’re a great tool for both sellers with a packed schedule, and store-owners that just like to work at their own pace
Which items were shipped the most 2024 vs 2025?
It’s interesting to see how popularity amongst items shifts throughout the year, particularly in the lead up to Black Friday. Understanding the trends and the online market can help you to make informed decisions about your own eCommerce store, for next Black Friday and the year ahead.
Items such as clothes, shoes, and bags, remain consistently high in shipping trends; they took the number one spot across September, October, and November, in both 2024 and 2025. Businesses see the demand for clothing items across Black Friday, implementing attractive sales to engage customers. This reliable shipping trend shows a safe avenue for new sellers to explore, offering deals on clothing items is highly likely to turn over sales.
September and October 2025, each showed over 110,000 shipping orders containing clothing units; this increased to over 118,000 in just November alone. These numbers are over double the amount of orders for the next leading item shipped across all three months; new businesses should research relevant clothing trends, and may want to break into the market. One thing new sellers should be mindful of is the saturation of the clothing market; such high numbers implies a large amount of businesses selling these units, and smaller businesses run the risk of being lost amongst them.
This is where events, like Black Friday, prove to be a useful business tool. New sellers can showcase their products, and draw attention to their stores, by offering more attractive discounts than other eCommerce retailers.
Books were amongst some of the most popular items to ship around Black Friday in both 2024, and 2025, with the units staying remarkably similar. Shipments containing toys dropped by around 3000 units from November 2024 to 2025, suggesting that they might not have been as much of a focus for Black Friday sales this year.
How have changes in the US affected parcel shipping for businesses?
2025 brought a lot of change to international parcel delivery, namely with shipping to the US. With the suspension of the de minimis exemption in August, which previously allowed shipments under $800 to enter the US duty-free, many parcels would be faced with new duties and taxes.
Fortunately, our top couriers found solutions by offering DDP (Delivery Duties Paid) services, meaning a sender can pay duties alongside the delivery cost, before shipping, allowing for a smooth journey through customs. DDP not only removes the difficulty of customs, but it stops receivers having to pay duty fees in order to collect their parcel; taking away this extra step builds trust between businesses and their US customer bases, as the buyer won’t be faced with any surprise payments post-shipping.
Roughly 28% of parcels were sent to the US with a DDP service in November 2025, as our top couriers continuously provided reliable, and affordable shipping solutions despite the changes. Regardless of new challenges, over 19,000 orders were shipped to the US from the UK in November 2025, a steady number compared to November 2024, prior to tariff changes. Our couriers offered unwavering service this year, and managed to see consistency in UK to US shipping.
"Despite navigating changes to the tariffs in the US, over 19,000 orders were shipped to the US from the UK in November 2025. Courier reliability and DDP services have allowed this to happen, proving that sellers and couriers can adapt to any situation to aid customers."
"Parcel2Go’s DDP (Delivery Duty Paid) services remain a top choice for sellers delivering to the US. With its convenience and affordability, it allows sellers to continue their international orders without the hurdles of additional costs for the recipient once the parcel reaches the US. A service like DDP builds trust with customers, and the amount of sellers using it shows how important international delivery is for growing businesses."
Ashley Taylor
How can Parcel2Go support businesses throughout Black Friday, and beyond?
Parcel2Go specialises in the needs of eCommerce sellers, and this Black Friday we helped seasoned sellers, and new store-owners prepare for growth in their business. We hosted a Smart Send masterclass, and updated our site with relevant shipping guides to make sure sellers understood what services were available to suit their business needs.
Smart Send is Parcel2Go’s free online tool for managing business orders, and during the busyness of Black Friday, it’s a helpful sidekick to get orders out on time. Total customers using Smart Send across Black Friday week, both in 2024 and 2025, sits at around 5,000. Generally, parcel shipping increases around events like Black Friday, and the festive season, and we can gather that customers using Smart Send were likely bulk shipping a large amount of orders.
With this boost of users, we can see how business increases across this period, and sellers are setting up preferences with top couriers to ensure their shipping runs smoothly. Online stores are turning to simpler solutions in order to prioritise the speed and efficiency of their businesses, and eCommerce sellers seem to be more comfortable relying on online tools.
Customers making their first Smart Send order increased from September 2025, remaining at a similar level to the 330 first orders that we saw in November 2024, this Black Friday. Around 400 users linked Smart Send with their online stores, likely seeing a need for the tool with their November business growth.
Black Friday is a positive time for most online businesses; it offers a chance for sellers to entice new customers with exclusive offers, grow orders with attractive discounts, and build trust with their buyers.
Sellers can use Parcel2Go’s Black Friday insights to predict future trends, and learn from other businesses ahead of the new year.