The poll, conducted Oct. 4-7, found U.S. shoppers plan to spend an average of $909 on Christmas gifts this season -- $2 more than a similar forecast at this time last year, the Gallup Organization said.

Gallup cautioned that last year's mid-October average estimate fell to $826 by mid-November.

If the spending estimate holds up through December it would possibly be enough to make this shopping season better than average, Gallup said. And if spending drops between now and November by as much as it did in 2006, the figure would still be at the upper end of the range seen in recent years, Gallup said.

Some 35 percent of adults nationwide said they would spend $1,000 or more on gifts, Gallup said. Twenty-seven percent said they would spend $500 to $999. Thirty percent planned to spend less than $500.

Eight percent offered no estimate, including some who said they did not celebrate Christmas.

The telephone poll of 1,010 national adults, age 18 and older, had a maximum margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points, so differences of less than that amount are statistically insignificant.