Black Friday is the biggest shopping holiday of the year. Traditionally, the sales would start the Friday following Thanksgiving. However, this custom has been severely relaxed recently, with retailers unveiling discounts as early as mid-October.

Black Friday 2022 falls on November 25th. It is easier to remember this year because the date makes it exactly one month before Christmas.

Known for the Liberty Bell, Cheesesteaks, and Rocky, Philadelphia also happens to be the birthplace of “Black Friday.” According to historians, this term was made popular in the 1960s by Philadelphia police officers to describe their post-Thanksgiving misery. 

On this day, they had to endure long work hours, terrible traffic, and crowd-related issues as tourists flooded the city to do their holiday shopping. In some years, the hordes of visitors would be even greater due to the Annual Army-Navy football game on Saturday. Eventually, the term caught on with the tourists and began to spread nationwide as they returned to their respective localities.

Unfortunately, the origin story of Cyber Monday isn’t nearly as interesting. This term was coined by the National Retail Federation in 2005 to encourage customers to start shopping online. Businesses marketed it as the online equivalent of Black Friday. But like a Hollywood blockbuster, the sequel usually isn’t as good as the original.

Customarily, Black Friday sales lasted through the weekend following Thanksgiving. Then, the baton of discounts gets passed to Cyber Monday. But with Black Friday deals starting earlier and earlier every year, the sales technically can last as long as a month and a half. 

Typically, the best deals can be found in-store. However, it is harder to capture these heavily discounted items due to simple supply and demand. The brick-and-mortar stores are limited in space, so the inventory of deal items won’t be very high. You have better chances to actually land deals online.

It depends on what’s on your wishlist for the holiday season. Black Friday usually covers all product categories and typically has the best deals. Cyber Monday, as the name sort of alludes to, is more affiliated with deals relating to tech: tablets, computers, electronics, etc. Retailers may reveal a crazy deal on one of the aforementioned categories during Cyber Monday, but it is generally better to buy on Black Friday.

The global supply chain issues are getting better but they aren’t completely resolved. More than likely, the retailers won’t have as much stock this year compared to prior years. This in turn may increase the difficulty of getting the items on your wishlist. Subsequently, it may also impact how good some deals will be. 

The Xbox Series X is a prime example of this. Since its release, the supply has been extremely scarce. Even though the console has been around for nearly two years, we have hardly seen any significant discounts. In fact, if you can get one at MSRP, you can consider yourself lucky.

With the demand overpowering the supply of products this year, the best thing to do is be prepared. You’ll want to compile your wishlist, do thorough deal research, and have all your checkout info ready. 2022 will be the most competitive Black Friday yet.

Yes, and it is a wonderful way to sweeten the Black Friday deals! Many retailers have their own partnered credit cards that can offer cashback of up to 5%. Of the many places that feature one, Amazon is arguably the best. During the holiday shopping season, some products are even eligible for double the cashback at 10%. Check out the best current cashback offers.