With 11 weeks left before Christmas Day, the USPS is preparing online shoppers by publishing holiday shipping deadlines. Those are the dates the Postal Service recommends shippers mail their packages in order to have them delivered by December 25, 2024.
The day after Thanksgiving used to be the day people looked for holiday shopping deals, known as Black Friday. But online retailers have pulled shopping forward, well before Halloween. In fact, today (October 8), kicked off Amazon Prime Big Deals Day and Walmart Holiday Deals sales.
Even so, USPS may have gotten a little ahead of itself in its announcement when it said, “The earlier you send, the better; don’t delay – mail and ship today!”
Interestingly the Postal Service is being more lenient with deadlines this year. For items sent Ground Advantage and First-Class Mail, it recommends shippers send packages by December 18, 2024; last year, it was December 16, 2023.
And while shippers have until December 19th to send packages via Priority Mail this year, they had until December 18th last year. (Shippers have until December 21st for Priority Mail Express compared to December 20th last year.)
The deadlines are shorter for packages sent to addresses in Alaska and Hawaii and of course for international packages. See the USPS website for details.
