• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, December 29, 2016

The supply of consumer attention to digital media crashed to a seasonal low on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but showed some spikes -- especially for desktop browsers -- in the days leading up to the holidays, no doubt due to last minute gift-related shopping.

The Digital Traffic Index, a collaboration of MediaPost and Jumpshot tracking the daily supply of mobile and desktop unique users, pages viewed and time spent of American consumers, fell to a 66.9 on Dec. 25th and a 69.3 on Dec. 24th.

That’s down from a 92.58 on Dec. 23, which was a seasonal high leading into the holidays, and an 89.04 on Dec. 26.

The holiday traffic was no doubt suppressed due to the fact that both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day fell on the weekend, which is the weekly low point for digital uniques, especially on desktop.

While mobile unique traffic fell slightly on Christmas Day, it wasn’t down appreciably from its recent norms and most of the seasonal volatility appears to have occurred among desktop users.

Desktop uniques crashed to 57.6 on Christmas Day, following a low of 61.88 on Christmas Eve, nearly half the desktop traffic of the days leading up to the holiday.

Pre-holiday desktop traffic peaked with a 122.68 on Dec. 19, as consumers no doubt were rushing orders to make their holiday gift-giving needs. That was only slightly higher than the 118.24 desktop unique index on Dec. 16, so-called “free shipping” day when many e-commerce retailers waived shipping fees for holiday orders.