59 Easter Statistics for 2026: Spending, Candy, Baskets & Traditions

Easter is one of America's biggest consumer holidays, generating billions in spending across candy, food, gifts, flowers, and more. Gourmet Gift Baskets reveals 59 data‑driven Easter statistics covering how much people spend, what they buy, and how they celebrate in 2026.

Easter Spending & Economics

Easter spending has climbed steadily over the past decade, evolvithe journalng from a religious occasion into a full-blown retail event.

Americans planned to spend a total of $23.6 billion on Easter in 2025, up from $22.4 billion in 2024 and approaching the record $24 billion spent in 2023.
The average Easter celebrant budgeted $189 per person in 2025, $12 more per person than the year before.
The record for per-person Easter spending was $192.01, set in 2023.
In 2009, total Easter spending was more than $12 billion, meaning the holiday has nearly doubled in economic impact in about 15 years.
The most popular Easter purchasing categories include candy (92%), food (89%), gifts (65%), decorations (51%), and clothing (49%).
Shoppers are expected to spend $7.4 billion on food, $3.8 billion on gifts, $3.5 billion on clothing, $3.3 billion on candy, $1.9 billion on flowers, and $1.7 billion on decorations.
Of those who do not plan to celebrate Easter, 54% still expect to spend an average of $25.43 per person on holiday-related items, totaling $0.8 billion.
Lower-income households earning under $50,000 a year are keeping their Easter spending flat, while higher-income families are driving the overall increase.
In a 2024 survey, among those spending more on Easter,56.2% cite higher prices on Easter-related items as the reason.
The global Easter market was valued at $124.29 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach $201.1 billion by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 6.2%.

Who Celebrates Easter & How?

Easter is often cited as the second most popular religious holiday after Christmas, and its cultural reach extends far beyond churchgoers.

About 79.2% of U.S. adults planned to celebrate Easter in 2025, down slightly from 80.7% in 2024.
The Easter celebration rate has decreased at roughly -0.11 percentage points per year over the past nine years, though it remains near 80%.
Among celebrants, 58% plan to cook a holiday meal, 55% visit friends and family, and 45% attend church on Easter Sunday.
A majority of families with children (54%) plan an Easter egg hunt at home.
About 53% of Americans dye Easter eggs despite high egg prices.
A surprising 57% of adults say they would love to compete in an Easter egg hunt, but feel it's just for kids.
In one small 2025 survey of U.S. Easter celebrants, 53% said they celebrate at home and 32% at a friend's or relative's house.
Tradition is the biggest motivator: 63% of shoppers say it drives their Easter purchases, while 36% are influenced by sales or promotions, and 32% shop because it's a fun social activity.

Easter Candy & Chocolate

Candy is the undisputed king of Easter spending. From chocolate bunnies to jelly beans, here's how Americans satisfy their sweet tooth.

A whopping 92% of Americans who celebrate Easter will include chocolate and candy in their festivities.
Easter confectionery sales topped $5.39 billion in 2024.
Easter is the second-biggest candy-consuming holiday after Halloween, accounting for a significant share of the $54 billion U.S. confectionery industry.
About 62% of all confectionery sales in 2024 were generated during the "big four" candy seasons: Valentine's Day, Easter, Halloween, and winter holidays.
One oft-cited estimate suggests Americans buy around 120 million pounds of candy for Easter each year.
Around 90 million chocolate bunnies are produced for Easter every year.
Americans consume roughly 16 billion jelly beans at Easter, enough to circle the globe nearly three times if lined end to end.
When eating a chocolate bunny, 78% of Americans start with the ears, 16% go feet-first, and 6% begin at the tail.
When it comes to chocolate bunnies, 42% prefer solid chocolate, 35% want a filling like caramel or peanut butter, and 23% prefer them hollow.
Non-chocolate candy grew 4.9% in dollar sales in 2024, far outpacing chocolate's 0.4% growth in Circana-measured channels.
U.S. retail chocolate sales rose 6.7% in 2025 compared to the prior year, largely driven by price increases rather than volume growth.
Chocolate prices at U.S. retail stores rose about 14.4% in the initial weeks of 2026 compared to a year earlier, nearly double the pace at the start of 2025.

Peeps, Jelly Beans & Iconic Easter Treats

Some Easter candies have become cultural icons in their own right.

Just Born produces approximately 5.5 million Peeps per day and about 2 billion Peeps per year — roughly six for every person in the United States.
More than 1.5 billion marshmallow Peeps are consumed each spring, making them the most popular non-chocolate Easter candy for over 20 years.
Easter accounts for 70% of Peeps' annual sales, making it by far the brand's most important season
Yellow is America's best-selling Peeps color, and the brand now offers more than a dozen flavors for the Easter season alone.
In 1953, it took 27 hours to hand-craft a single Marshmallow Peep. Today, the automated process takes just six minutes.
Jelly bean purchases spike 16.6 times higher than the yearly average on the day before Easter, according to Instacart data
Lollipop purchases also surge, with 3.7 times more orders the day before Easter compared to the rest of the year.
Instacart’s recent data names Reese’s Peanut Butter Eggs as the top‑selling Easter candy nationwide, and earlier surveys have found it the favorite in around 29 states.
Peeps are a standout local favorite in Boston (purchases up 150%), Philadelphia (up 97%), and Washington, D.C. (up 111%) during Easter weekend compared to the national average.

Easter Baskets & Gifting

Easter baskets aren't just for kids anymore. Adults want in on the fun, and gift-givers are getting more creative.

About 65% of consumers purchase Easter gifts, with the category generating $3.8 billion in spending.
According to Ferrero’s Easter Celebration Index, 62% of adults say they would like to receive their own Easter basket.
Among parents, 80% admit to stealing candy from their kids' Easter baskets each year.
About 60% of parents plan on sending Easter baskets to their children who have moved out of the home.
For baskets that do include candy, the breakdown is 29% chocolate eggs and bunnies, 25% jellybeans, and 14% Peeps.
Beyond candy, Easter basket fillers like bubble wands saw a 9.2 times spike in purchases during Easter weekend, and stuffed animals experienced a 6.2 times higher order share compared to the yearly average.
Roughly nine in ten parents of parents who make Easter baskets plan to include chocolate and other candies.

Egg Prices & Easter Traditions

Skyrocketing egg prices reshaped Easter traditions in 2025 and continue to affect the holiday in 2026.

The average price of a dozen eggs hit $6.23 in March 2025, a record high that was roughly 60.4% more expensive than in March 2024
A WalletHub survey found that 47% of Americans planned to skip dyeing eggs for Easter 2025 due to high costs.
Nearly two in five Americans expected tariffs to affect their Easter spending, while 47% pointed to inflation.
Despite the high prices, PAAS — the leading egg dye kit maker — shipped 20% more egg decorating kits in 2025 than the year before, thanks to high demand and a longer selling season.
A PAAS consumer survey found 94% of consumers who celebrate Easter and typically dye eggs still planned to do so, regardless of cost.

Flowers & Décor for Easter

Easter is one of the year's biggest moments for floral purchases and spring decorating.

Consumers are expected to spend $1.9 billion on flowers and $1.7 billion on decorations for Easter.
When buying flowering houseplants for Easter, 52% choose lilies, making them the holiday's signature bloom.
About 74% of Easter flower buyers are women, and 73% of Easter floral purchases are intended as gifts.
Nearly 95% of the world’s Easter lily bulbs are grown along a small strip of coastal land on the California–Oregon border near Smith River, California — known as the ‘Easter Lily Capital of the World.”

Fun Facts & Easter Traditions

Easter has a long and quirky history in the United States.

The White House Easter Egg Roll dates back to 1878 under President Rutherford B. Hayes, making it one of the oldest traditions in presidential history.
The world's most expensive chocolate Easter bunny costs $49,000. It was made in 2015 with 1.7-carat diamond eyes.
Hallmark offers 273 different Easter card designs each year.
About 41% of Americans feel the Easter Bunny should give out money, like the Tooth Fairy.

Sources

All statistics above are sourced from the National Retail Federation (NRF), National Confectioners Association (NCA), Prosper Insights & Analytics, WalletHub, Instacart, Google Trends, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Medill Spiegel Research Center, AP News, USA TODAY, PBS, and other authoritative outlets.

National Retail Federation (NRF) – Easter spending press release (Consumers to Spend $23.6 Billion on Easter)
NRF – “4 Trends Behind Easter 2025 Spending”
Firework – “17 Easter Marketing Statistics: Trends, Consumer Spending & Sales”
Statista – “Consumers’ Planned Easter Spending U.S. 2025”
Medill Spiegel Research Center – Easter shoppers and participation insights
Maximize Market Research – Easter Market: Product Categories Analysis and Forecast
National Confectioners Association (NCA) – “Easter Treats Have Consumers Eggs‑Cited for Chocolate and Candy”
NACS / NCA – “NCA Highlights Most‑Purchased Easter Candies”
ABC News – “90 Million Chocolate Bunnies and Other Fun Easter Facts”
Fox News – “Chocolate Easter bunnies leaped from Pennsylvania Dutch ingenuity…”
PBS NewsHour – “If cocoa is cheaper, why isn’t chocolate too?” (cocoa/chocolate price explainer)
ABC News (video clip/social) – chocolate prices up 14.4% early 2026
AP News – “Go inside the factory where Peeps are made”
Farmers’ Almanac – “10 Fun Facts About Marshmallow Peeps”
Just Born – corporate “Fun Facts” page for Peeps,/li>
Business Insider – “How Just Born makes 5.5 million Peeps a day for Easter”
Instacart data blog – “Hopping into Spring: Instacart reveals America’s most loved and loathed Easter and Passover foods”
iHeart/1027mix – “Easter Round‑Up: 57% of adults want to hunt for eggs, plus 10 more Easter stats”
Resonio – “Easter in the US: What the Holiday Means to People in 2025”
TimeOut – “This is how Americans are really celebrating Easter this year”
LinkedIn article – “Easter 2025 By The Numbers: From Church To Chocolate Baskets”
SAN (Straight Arrow News) – “Easter candy spending surges as states show sweet tooth preferences”
Yahoo/Creators – “The top Easter candy in every state, according to Google”
Mental Floss – “Every State’s Favorite Easter Candy, Mapped”
New York Post – “Easter candies and Passover foods favorites in US: survey”
Axios – “America’s favorite Easter candy: Reese’s Peanut Butter Eggs”
USA TODAY – “Most popular Easter candy by state”
Daily Voice (using WalletHub data) – “Egg Prices Leave Wallets Scrambled: Easter 2025’s Costs Outlined in New Study”
CBS News – “Egg prices aren’t stopping families from dyeing eggs, an Easter tradition”
New York Times – “Easter Eggs Are So Expensive Americans Are Dyeing Potatoes”
FloraLife – “Easter Flowers by the Numbers 2015”
Society of American Florists – “Easter/Passover Floral Statistics”
Eastern Floral – “The Easter Lily Capital of the World”
The White House – “The White House Easter Egg Roll” (official event page)
NPR – “White House hosts thousands for its annual Easter Egg Roll”,/li>
Regional/WalletHub‑based Easter fun‑facts piece (e.g., Valdosta Today) – “New report finds 47% of Americans to skip egg dyeing due to high cost”