What is Black Friday?

Black Friday is the Friday following Thanksgiving Day in the United States, which is on the fourth Thursday of November. It has been regarded as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season in the US since 1952, although the term "Black Friday" did not become widely used until the 1980s.

Black Friday is characterized by highly promoted sales at discounted prices, and many stores open early, sometimes as early as midnight or even on Thanksgiving Day. In recent years, Black Friday has also become a major online shopping event.

The term "Black Friday" is thought to have originated in Philadelphia in the 1950s, when police used the term to describe the heavy traffic and congestion that occurred on the day after Thanksgiving. Another theory is that the term comes from the accounting practice of recording losses in red ink and profits in black ink. Retailers traditionally operated at a loss for most of the year, and hoped that Black Friday sales would put them in the black for the first time that year.