Giving Tuesday 2025 saw more donors making more (but smaller) gifts compared to last year which resulted in marginal year-over-year gains in revenue.
Rising levels of competition in email and paid search, paired with shifting dynamics in organic web revenue, made it more difficult to make up ground from smaller average gift sizes. Improved Meta advertising effectiveness and efficiency helped cover the gap for programs that made a bigger investment, however.
These trends provide a practical roadmap for adjusting messaging, budgets, and priorities in the final weeks of the year to make the most of your remaining fundraising window.
Giving Tuesday — insights you can use
The day after Giving Tuesday is when many teams start asking the same questions: Did we meet expectations? How did the rest of the industry perform? Do we need to pivot for year-end?
We’re here to help you answer those questions with clarity. Drawing on cross-channel results from our nonprofit clients, we’ve compiled Giving Tuesday 2025 trends across email, web, paid search, and Meta to surface what worked, what shifted, and where there may be new opportunities.
Read on to discover the key trends we’re seeing and learn how they can help ground your internal conversations and guide your next moves with confidence.
Increased donor volume drives minor revenue gains, even as average gift declines
In stark contrast to trends from the past several years, the combined cross-channel average gift declined 15% while total donations were up 17% on average, resulting in a median 4% increase in revenue year-over-year. This tells us that more people raised their hands to give but often at slightly lower dollar levels than in previous years.
Organic web giving under pressure as paid steps in
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Email performance slips amid growing competition for donor attention
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Paid search scaled dramatically — at a cost
Investment in paid search and Google Performance Max (PMAX) jumped dramatically this year, and that spend translated into 40% more revenue, and 80% more donations. At the same time, the average cost per click (CPC) rose sharply, resulting in a 35% average drop in return on ad spend (ROAS).
Meta delivered growth and improved efficiency
Paid ads on Meta (Facebook, Instagram, and Threads) still represent a smaller share of the overall pie, but the programs that leaned in saw strong YoY gains. Meta ad spend increased by a third, while revenue rose more than 50%, and median ROAS saw slight improvements. Under the hood, the platform felt more competitive this year, even as organizations benefited from lower CPMs and more efficient campaigns, particularly where budgets prioritized warm, high-intent audiences.
So...what does it all mean?
Taken together, these trends paint a clear picture of the landscape we’re operating in as we head into the final weeks of the year: More people are giving but at lower dollar amounts; paid channels are doing more of the heavy lifting (and paying more for the privilege); and core workhorses like email and organic search are feeling the squeeze.
The opportunity now is to use what we’ve learned from Giving Tuesday to make focused, realistic choices for year-end by doubling down on what’s working, tightening what isn’t, and making sure every click has a clear next step behind it.
If you saw an influx of smaller gifts, plan smart follow-ups and upgrade asks in December. If email struggled, refine cadence, targeting, and aggressive creative tactics instead of simply sending more. If paid search and Meta performed well, consider shifting incremental budget there and aligning your strongest creative around key giving moments in late December.
If you’d like help making sense of your Giving Tuesday performance or translating these trends into an End of Year plan, we’d love to talk—reach out to the team at Interactive Strategies.
Note: All percentage changes above reflect median results across participating organizations to limit the impact of outliers.
Insights
Insight
The numbers are in: #GivingTuesday 2024 trends revealed
Organic web is still the single largest driver of donations on Giving Tuesday, bringing in nearly half of all day-of revenue. But this year it softened, with revenue down 18% due to decreases in both donations and average gift. We noted nearly universal increases in paid search impression volume, but also a substantially more competitive bidding landscape compared to last year. It’s fair to wonder how much AI search overviews were squeezing out organic search results and leading to prioritized paid placements—and just how much that led to organic search cannibalization from paid ads as a result.
Email continued to pull a large share of the Giving Tuesday pie, with nearly a third of total revenue, but performance slipped. Email-sourced revenue was down roughly 18% and average gift declined 19%, while gift counts were essentially flat. Engagement metrics point to the same story: click rates dropped and conversion rates dipped below last year’s high, even as overall response rate nudged up slightly. To put a fine point on it: Those who did engage were still motivated to give…there just weren’t enough of them to make up for smaller gift sizes.
