U.S. ecommerce sales growth in Q3 2025 continued to slow to a rate below that of almost every quarter during the prior three years, according to Digital Commerce 360 analysis of data from the Department of Commerce.
Growing at a rate of 5.2% year over year, U.S. ecommerce sales in Q3 increased at a slightly slower rate than in Q2 (5.3%). U.S. ecommerce sales growth in each quarter of 2025 for which data is available has been slower than in each quarter of 2023 and 2024, according to Digital Commerce 360 analysis. Meanwhile, the trend has been gradually slowing growth in each quarter of 2025.
Additionally, ecommerce sales growth in Q3 outpaced total retail growth, which increased 4.3% year over year. Offline retail sales grew 4.1% year over year in Q3.
“Q3 2025 marked the third consecutive quarter of sub-6% ecommerce growth rate, something that has not happened in America since 2009,” said Jon Love, research data manager at Digital Commerce 360. “The continued slowdown is due in large part to deepening worries about high prices, especially among middle and lower-class consumers, and the sustained negative impacts of wide-ranging tariffs.”
Total U.S. ecommerce sales in Q3
In Q3, U.S. ecommerce sales reached $299.64 billion, according to Digital Commerce 360 analysis of unadjusted Commerce Department data. That’s up 2.2% from $292.93 billion in Q2 ecommerce sales.
Adjusting for seasonal variation but not for price changes, the Commerce Department said, U.S. ecommerce sales totaled $310.3 billion in Q3. Meanwhile, under the same criteria, total retail sales in Q3 reached about $1.894 trillion.
Q3 marked the 17th consecutive quarter in which ecommerce sales grew less than 10% year over year, according to Digital Commerce 360 analysis. Before Q2 2021, ecommerce sales had only grown by less than 10% year over year in a quarter once — in Q1 2019 — going back to 2010.
Ecommerce represented a 26.8% share of year-over-year total retail growth in Q3. That’s slightly more than in Q2 (26.5%) but less than in Q1 (33.5%). 2025 marks the first year with quarters in which ecommerce’s share of total retail growth was less than 30% since Q2 2022, when it was a 17% share.
Furthermore, ecommerce penetration of total sales reached 22.5% in Q3. That’s slightly more than in Q2 (22%) and less than in Q1 (22.7%).
Since the COVID-19 pandemic broke out in the U.S. in Q1 2020, only two quarters have seen sub-20% ecommerce penetration: Q3 2020 (19.9%) and Q3 2021 (19.8%). Moreover, prior to Q2 2020, ecommerce penetration in the U.S. had never reached 20%.
How is ecommerce penetration calculated?
Including all retail and food-service sales, U.S. ecommerce accounted for 16.4% of total sales in Q3 2025, according to the Commerce Department. Unadjusted figures show U.S. ecommerce sales represented 15.8% of total sales in Q2, the Commerce Department said. It estimates that total, unadjusted U.S. ecommerce sales in Q2 2025 reached $299.6 billion.
Digital Commerce 360 studies non-seasonally adjusted commerce department data and excludes spending in segments that don’t typically sell online. These segments include:
- Restaurants
- Bars
- Automobile dealers
- Gas stations
- Fuel dealers
U.S. ecommerce penetration reflects the share of dollars consumers could potentially spend online.
The Commerce Department defines ecommerce sales as the sales of goods and services where an order is placed by the buyer or price and terms of sales are negotiated over:
- Internet
- Extranet
- Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) network
- Electronic mail
- Other online system
Payment may or may not be made online. The Commerce Department publishes estimates that it adjusts for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes.
Percentage changes may not align exactly with dollar figures due to rounding. Here’s last quarter’s update on U.S. ecommerce sales.
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