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Shopping centers lose audience, see sales fall and face a new crisis with online shopping, home office, and decline of cinema in Brazil.
Brazilian shopping centers remain giants on the outside, but they no longer carry the same attraction as before. The sector closed 2025 with 658 enterprises, 471 million visitors per month, and revenue of R$ 200.9 billion, in addition to 11 new openings planned for 2026. The problem is that this size no longer guarantees the same relevance in the consumer’s routine.
The clearest sign of this shift appears in the flow. Data reported by the press based on sector surveys show that monthly visits to shopping centers were 6.2% below the level of 2019, before the pandemic, and that 2025 marked the first decline in audience since the post-Covid recovery.
In terms of revenue, the picture became even harsher: nominal revenue increased, but real sales lost strength when inflation was taken into account.
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The change in habits weighed more than many beautiful displays. E-commerce closed 2025 with revenue of R$ 235.5 billion, surpassing the R$ 200.9 billion recorded by shopping centers, consolidating a scenario where digital shopping ceased to be supportive and began to compete at the center of the consumption journey.
In 2024, e-commerce had already generated R$ 204.3 billion, with 414.9 million orders, showing that the migration was not a one-time event.
This shift hits hardest in the categories that have always sustained the corridors of shopping centers.
Durable and semi-durable goods depend more on credit, terms, and consumer confidence, and the CNC itself emphasizes that indebtedness, default, and income commitment continue to be central variables for measuring the future consumption capacity of families.
When money gets tight, impulse gives way to price research — and the internet wins this competition with just a few clicks.
Even cinema, which for decades was treated as a natural anchor for audiences, can no longer hold the same movement.
In 2019, cinemas in the country sold about 172.2 million tickets. In 2024, the total audience was 125.3 million.
At the same time, Brazil set a record with 3,510 operating screens, and about 88% of them are located in shopping centers.
The result is harsh for the traditional model: there is structure, there is a screen, but the crowd from before is missing.
The hybrid home office also affected the math of the corridors. Industry executives already admit that Fridays have lost traction and that companies with two or three remote days per week reduce visits during times that were once almost automatic.
The shopping center that relied on in-person workers for lunch, coffee, pharmacy, cinema, and convenience shopping now competes for attention with home, delivery, and mobile phones.
The retail response has already begun, and it revolves around the clock. Retailers are discussing whether it still makes sense to keep operations open for 12 hours a day when the nighttime peak has weakened and lunch has begun to gain importance in various operations.
Alexandre Birman, from Azzas 2154, has already argued that the sector should discuss opening earlier, closing earlier, and even reviewing Sundays in some cases.
In the same vein, retail entrepreneurs in shopping malls say that ending activities at 8 PM or 9 PM would change little in the sales of some categories.
This pressure has increased even more with the debate about the end of the 6×1 schedule. Abrasce states that the change, if implemented without transition, could lead to a drop of over 12% in sales and jobs in the sector.
The association also mentions a billion-dollar impact on revenue, at a time when many retailers are already operating with tight margins and high costs.
The message from the market is clear: it is not possible to discuss working hours as if the shopping mall of 2026 were still the same as that of 2019.
At the same time, the landscape of the sector does not collapse uniformly. The Northeast has been standing out from the crisis and led the average revenue per shopping mall in 2025, with R$ 350.4 million per establishment, above the national average.
This shows that the exhaustion of the model is not uniform: location, income, store mix, food, services, and entertainment still make a huge difference between a shopping mall that thrives and another that merely keeps its doors open.
The shopping mall has not died, but it has lost its status as the automatic destination for Brazilian consumption. The country still opens new centers, maintains a gigantic structure, and continues to generate high revenue.
However, the customer has changed faster than the model. Now, the sector is racing to prove that it can still be relevant in a world where shopping has become easier without parking, without lines, and without aisles.
Comment if you still visit shopping malls as before and share this article with those who follow retail, consumption, and changes in commerce in Brazil.
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