Thanksgiving and Black Friday mark the beginning of the year-end shopping season, and this year retailers pulled out all stops to ensure that they capture the buyers’ attention. For some retailers, preparing for the shopping madness meant ensuring that customers that prefer to shop on their mobile devices could check out orders hassle free. But just how many users took to mobile to pay for their stuff?

According to eBay and PayPal (a subsidiary of eBay), Thanksgiving 2012 brought a 2.5-fold in the global volume of mobile transactions over the same day of 2011. Also, the number of customers that used tablets or smartphones to shop this Thanksgiving was 164% higher than last year.

PayPal also offered a couple of details about the most mobile-friendly shoppers in the US. Apparently, people in Houston, LA, Chicago, Miami, and New York made the most mobile purchases, while the hourly interval with the most activity in this area was 12pm to 1pm PST.

Did you try out mobile shopping? Have you ever paid for an item from your smartphone or tablet?