Online shoppers are set to spend almost £300,000 per minute today in what is predicted to be the busiest internet shopping day of the year.
Dubbed 'Manic Monday', a total of £424 million will be spent on Christmas presents and other festive goods throughout the day, according to the Centre for Retail Research.
Shopping comparison website Kelkoo said the spending spree is a week earlier than last year with many people worried about a repeat of the extreme snow-related delays to deliveries which gripped the UK last December.
It said research showed UK shoppers will spend a fifth (19.4%) of their Christmas budget online, totalling $13.4bn - up by 16.3% compared to last year.
It is believed 33.7% of online spending will be on gifts, 24.5% on Christmas travel, 20.6% on decorations and 6.7% on food and drink.
Kelkoo chief marketing officer Chris Simpson told Sky News that more and more people are making purchases online.
"There's a general trend in more people buying online - it's about 16% up year-on-year review," he said.
"I think, at a time when people are trying to stretch their budgets, they go online and expect to see savings and generally they save on average about 15% compared to prices in the high street."
He said the survey revealed that people choose to buy gifts online because of the convenience, reduced stress and cheaper prices.
The research would do nothing to quell fears of another miserable Christmas for high street retailers.
Total retail footfall - including high streets, shopping centres and out-of-town retail parks - was down 2.3% in the three months to the end of October compared to the same period the previous year, according to British Retail Consortium figures.
The West Midlands, Scotland and Northern Ireland were the regions worst affected, while Wales and the South East enjoyed an increase in shopper numbers.
But as more people turn to the web to shop, leading online auction and shopping site eBay is turning to the high street to capture more customers.
The site is opening it first UK store in Dean Street, just off Oxford St in London, as part of a five-day experiment in the lead up to Christmas.
The shop, open from December 1-5, will feature a display of 200 predicted best-sellers - but customers will not be able to buy them.
Instead, people will be able to use their mobile phones or in-store computers to scan QR codes on items they are interested in before ordering them on the eBay site.
Experts believe the store will be a hit as it will mean shoppers can see and select an item without having to carry it around with them for the rest of tne day.
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