Apple overtook Tesco, Argos and M&S this year to become the second most popular online retail site in the UK. Only Amazon UK beat them for hits in the latest quarterly figures published by IMRG HitsWise.

The frenzy around the launch of the iPhone 4S in September probably drove up the number of people clicking on the Apple site.

The top five UK sites for online retail – as measured by traffic – are: 1. Amazon, 2. Apple, 3. Argos, 4. Tesco and 5. Next. M&S (6), John Lewis (9) and Play.com (7) fill out the top 10. Home and Garden online shops did poorly in the last three months, with Homebase and IKEA each dropping several slots, and travel sites suffered too.

The fastest movers this quarter were ASDA Direct (up 23 places), Very.co.uk (+19), Ticketmaster (+16), H&M (+15).

Toys R Us was a surprising success story – rising 15 places to 48th and receiving a high share of traffic from people searching for toys, including Lego and Peppa Pig. ®

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