Amazon.com edges out Walmart on Black Friday online traffic

While Walmart dominated Thanksgiving Day online traffic, Amazon.com saw the most traffic on Black Friday, which is the traditional beginning of the holiday sales season.

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Experian Hitwise reported that Amazon was the top-visited retail web site among the top 500 retail sites on the internet. Overall traffic to retail web sites was up 4 percent on Black Friday compared to Thanksgiving Day, the day before. But year over year, traffic was down 9 percent compared to Black Friday a year ago.

Amazon got 13.55 percent of U.S. visits among the top 500, up 22 percent from 11.06 percent on Black Friday a year ago and up 9 percent from Thanksgiving Day this year. This is the second year in a row that Amazon was the top site on Black Friday. That means that the typical pattern is holding up, as Walmart.com has been the No. 1 site on Thanksgiving Day for the past five years.

Walmart was the second-most-visited site with 11.8 percent of visits to the top 500, up 13 percent from 9.88 percent on Black Friday a year ago but down 25 percent from Thanksgiving Day 2009. Target had 5.65 percent of visits to the top 500 sites on Black Friday, up 22 percent from 4.62 percent a year ago, and flat compared to Thanksgiving Day 2009.

Among the top 20 sites visited on Black Friday this year, the Apple Store saw the largest increase in visits compared to Thanksgiving Day, with a 110 percent increase. Staples saw a 47 percent increase from a year ago and Dell saw a 40 percent increase. The next milestone to watch is Cyber Monday, tomorrow, which is typically one of the heaviest days for e-commerce sales during the holiday season.