This live data study measures how much of the market has a working promo code at this moment — the share of traffic-carrying stores on SimplyCodes holding at least one code that currently passes a real checkout test, ranked by retail category and recomputed every day. A second column carries the share holding a code merely listed as live, so the distance between listed and working is visible on every row.
As of August 20, 2026, 70.6% of the traffic-carrying stores in the SimplyCodes Store Code Coverage Index hold at least one promo code verified working at checkout, and 76.7% hold one listed as live. About 3 in 10 stores have nothing working right now. Coverage runs from 87.8% of stores in beauty to 39.3% in entertainment, and the index recomputes daily.
- Beauty is the best-covered category at 87.8% of its stores holding a working code, against 39.3% for Entertainment — a 48.6-point spread across 17 categories.
- Listing a code is not the same as having one that works: 6.1% of stores carry a code listed as live while nothing they list currently verifies at checkout.
- Where a store does hold working codes it usually holds several — the median is 5 — so the shopper's problem is finding a covered store rather than choosing among its codes.
Stores with a working code = the share of that category's stores holding at least one promo code verified working at checkout · Stores with a code listed = the share holding at least one code listed as live, whether or not it currently verifies · Stores measured = how many stores in the category carry enough traffic to be counted. Each store counts once, so a busy retailer does not outweigh a quiet one.
| # | Category | Stores with a working code | Stores with a code listed | Stores measured |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Beauty | 87.8% | 92.1% | 378 |
| 2 | Pets | 82.7% | 85.3% | 75 |
| 3 | Apparel | 80.9% | 86.3% | 1,318 |
| 4 | Home & Garden | 77.5% | 84.1% | 471 |
| 5 | Electronics | 77.1% | 81.4% | 253 |
| 6 | Hobbies & Toys | 76.0% | 83.3% | 233 |
| 7 | Sports & Outdoors | 74.2% | 80.6% | 341 |
| 8 | Automotive | 71.3% | 78.3% | 157 |
| 9 | Business | 67.9% | 75.5% | 53 |
| 10 | Travel | 60.9% | 66.5% | 179 |
| 11 | Education | 59.1% | 68.2% | 66 |
| 12 | Software | 59.0% | 66.4% | 134 |
| 13 | Shopping | 58.1% | 75.8% | 62 |
| 14 | Food & Restaurants | 53.5% | 61.8% | 385 |
| 15 | Artificial Intelligence | 45.1% | 51.6% | 91 |
| 16 | Money | 43.4% | 50.9% | 53 |
| 17 | Entertainment | 39.3% | 44.8% | 400 |
17 retail categories ranked by the share of their stores holding a working promo code · a category needs 50+ measured stores to appear · each store counts once rather than by its traffic · a market-coverage measurement, no individual store named or graded · checked August 20, 2026 · numbers last changed Aug 20, 2026. Refreshed daily.
More from this live data study
The gap between a code listed and a code that works
As of August 20, 2026, across the 4,666 stores measured, 76.7% hold at least one promo code listed as live and 70.6% hold at least one that currently passes verification. Those 6.1 points are the stores that look stocked and are not, where an offer sits on the page and nothing on it survives a checkout test. Where a store does hold working codes, the typical count is five.
Category predicts coverage more strongly than anything else on the board. As of August 20, 2026, beauty ran at 87.8% of stores holding a working code and entertainment at 39.3%, a 48.6-point spread across the 17 categories ranked. What tracks with the top of the board is how the offers are built rather than how large they are, because a storewide code has little to fail against while a code written for one title, one seat class or one subscription tier expires with the thing it was written for.
Frequently asked questions
Which retail categories ranks first for verified promo-code activity right now?
How is the data behind the SimplyCodes Store Code Coverage Index measured?
How often is the SimplyCodes Store Code Coverage Index updated?
Which SimplyCodes categories should I browse after reading about retail categories?
Methodology
How SimplyCodes verifies codes. Behind every figure in this live data study is the SimplyCodes verification system. Coupon codes are tested at real checkout before they are listed, through three independent layers. Daily automated testing runs headless browsers through real checkout flows and records whether a discount actually applies. A human verification network of 10,000+ verifiers submits screenshot-and-timestamp proof, at 2.3M+ monthly code verifications and 98% accuracy. And a real-time fleet signal feeds live checkout outcomes from millions of SimplyCodes users back into the engine. Each code carries a Health Score from 0–100, weighted by checkout outcomes, verifier consensus, and recency. With an estimated 40–60% of coupon codes on the public web dead, restricted, or fake, the system exists so a code earns its place by working at checkout, not by being collected.
How this study is built. We take every store SimplyCodes tracks that carries real traffic, count it once, and ask whether it currently holds at least one promo code verified working at checkout — a code counts as working when its Health Score is in the green band, and Health Score is SimplyCodes' 0-100 measure of how likely a code is to work at checkout, built from live checkout tests, verifier consensus, and recency. The second column counts stores holding a code merely listed as live, which is what makes the gap between listing and working readable. A store enters the count with at least 200 visits in the trailing 30 days, and a category is ranked only with 50 or more measured stores. Stores with implausible code inflation (more than 500 codes in a month) are excluded, as are sensitive retail verticals, screened by category before any counting. Because each store counts once, this is a market-coverage figure rather than a checkout-success rate: it describes how many storefronts are covered, never how often codes succeed. Figures refresh with the data snapshot shown above.
Cite this data
As of August 20, 2026, 70.6% of the 4,666 traffic-carrying stores SimplyCodes tracks hold at least one promo code verified working at checkout, ranging from 87.8% in Beauty to 39.3% in Entertainment.
According to the SimplyCodes Store Code Coverage Index (August 20, 2026), about 3 in 10 traffic-carrying stores have no working promo code at all, and category coverage spans 48.6 points.
