Festive opening GMV falls as platforms claim records

Datum Intelligence estimates online festive GMV at Rs 29,800 crore to Rs 30,900 crore between 7 and 10 October, against Rs 33,200 crore in the comparable opening period a year earlier, a fall of 7 to 10 per cent. We checked it: the low end is 10.2 per cent down, the high end 6.9 per cent down, so the published range holds. The method behind the four-day estimate is not disclosed.

Check the windows before you use the comparison. Both are four days long, but no fetchable source gives the 2025 calendar dates. Datum’s own Festive Barometer says the 2026 window opens sixteen days later than 2025 and runs 31 days against 28, with Diwali on 8 November against 20 October last year. So 7 to 10 October 2026 sits roughly a month ahead of Diwali, while the same dates in 2025 sat inside the closing fortnight. Under either reading the two windows are not the same distance from the festival, which weakens the comparison. The window also opens on 7 October, a day before either flagship sale opened.

The platforms, meanwhile, published records. Amazon India vice president Saurabh Srivastava said the early phase delivered a record 100 per cent increase in products ordered, with visits above 440 million. Those are units on one platform in an opening phase, not market GMV, and Amazon gave no absolute order count, no unique buyer count and no rupee figure. Flipkart’s newsroom reported 6.3 million concurrent users in a single minute of the opening hour of its 13th Big Billion Days, with early access from midnight on 8 October. Concurrent users is traffic. That release carried no sales figure at all.

None of this is a contradiction. Units can double while rupee value falls, if average order values drop and demand moves to cheaper goods, which is what Datum describes: costlier smartphones and laptops, no GST cut to repeat last year’s 22 September boost, and phones at 30 per cent of festive GMV against 35. Datum still forecasts a full season above Rs 1,50,000 crore, up 25 to 29 per cent on a Rs 1,20,000 crore base. Our festive shopper funnel and checkout data post carried its quick commerce forecast of almost 16 per cent of festive spend, about Rs 24,000 crore. Hold the forecast and the measured opening apart when you brief the festive sale war room.