High Street stores and online retailers are bringing forward their Boxing Day sales in a final 'big push' to improve Christmas trade.
Clothing retailer Gap has already launched 50 per cent price cuts along with the likes of French Connection, Hobbs and some other fashion stores.
And retailers such as John Lewis, Comet, B&Q and Halfords have announced that sales will begin at their internet outlets on Christmas Eve.
Such is the rise of the internet that 4.3million Britons are expected to log on to make purchases on Christmas Day, spending 120million, up 17 per cent on a year ago.
The number going shopping on the internet is almost on a par with the 4.5million expected to attend church on Christmas morning.
On the High Street, a third of retailers are already offering half price sales or heavy discounts, according to retail business analysts, Global Retail Network.
The organisation's chief executive Brendan Dorrian said: 'This is the consumers' Christmas.
'Discounting started in earnest during the first week of December, and doubled during the last two weeks.
'Half price is the new 20 per cent off, and there has been a sharp increase in the discount level at which retailers begin their sales.'
The e-retailing body IMRG said online sales in December are expected to be up by 14 per cent on a year ago, taking them to 5.2billion.
Robin Goad, research director at Experian Hitwise, which measures web traffic, said: 'Last year, Christmas Day was the seventh busiest online day of the year for online retailers, while Boxing Day was the busiest.
'Over the last few years the importance of these two days has been increasing, and we see no reason for it to be any different this Christmas.'
Brian McBride, managing director of Amazon UK, said: 'In 2008, we saw a 150 per cent increase in sales on Christmas Day compared to the previous year.
'One of the great things about the advent of internet shopping is that you now have stores that are open 24/7, every single day of the year.
'We saw high volumes of gift certificates being redeemed on Christmas Day as well as a substantial number of MP3 tracks being purchased, with people presumably logging on to get content for the MP3 player that they had received as a gift earlier that day.'
On Christmas Day last year, Lastminute.com saw a spike in the number of people logging on and booking trips at 3.30pm.
John Lewis will start its clearance sale online from 6pm on Christmas Eve and in its department stores on December 27.
Comet begins its web sale at 7pm on Christmas Eve.
Tesco started its internet sale on many products today.
It is promising half-price deals on furniture, homeware and sports products.
Electrical items will follow online on Christmas Eve at 8pm.
