With a hard Brexit looming, 2020 will be the peak of cross-border ecommerce penetration in the UK, according to the latest forecast from eMarketer, an Insider Intelligence company. This year, 22.8 million people in the UK will have made a cross-border ecommerce purchase, representing 46.0% of internet users and 50.2% of digital buyers.

When the UK government announced a nationwide lockdown for November, the impetus for retail holiday ecommerce shopping was ratcheted up another notch, given that Black Friday shopping falls within this period.

Physical retail has suffered hugely under the weight of the coronavirus. Ecommerce has benefited to the tune of a 14.7% rise in sales this year, and digital habits are forming that will last beyond the pandemic.

Digital retail will have a huge impact on UK shopper trends in the coming holiday season. This year, ecommerce will account for nearly a third of all holiday spending, its largest share to date. Brick-and- mortar shopping, meanwhile, remains on the precipice.

The UK is something of a global leader when it comes to retail ecommerce. As a proportion of total retail sales, only China will trump the UK in ecommerce sales penetration this year (41.2% versus 30.9%, respectively). The UK’s fulfillment and delivery infrastructure is, as one would expect, quite mature.

From midnight on March 23, the UK government enforced the closure of nonessential retail stores in the UK as part of strict lockdown measures. This shuttering was only lifted on June 15. During those intervening 12 weeks, UK consumers wanting to purchase anything other than groceries or medications could not do so in-store.

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The 2019 holiday season capped a tough year for physical retailers in the UK, with brick-and-mortar sales down for the second year running. However, strong gains in retail ecommerce sales meant that overall, retail sales saw growth during the season.

This will be a tough year for holiday season retail in the UK. Shoppers will spend less in 2020, and much of their spend will fall outside the traditional November–December time frame, leading to the lowest holiday retail sales total since 2015.

Every country we analyze in the region saw double-digit growth in ecommerce—those gains ranged from an estimated 11.8% in France to 36.0% in Spain. In fact, Spain was the third-fastest-growing retail ecommerce market worldwide among the 32 countries we track. Across the EU-4 and the UK specifically, the outlook also varied.