Wayfair said its U.S. business is showing signs of recovery after a long period of sluggishness following the Covid-19 pandemic.

The furniture company said sequential sales growth in the latest period made this the best second quarter since 2020. Wayfair has been waiting for a rebound over the past several years, as the homebuying market has slowed down and Americans pulled back on home goods purchases.

"While there's still some broader macro uncertainty and depressed housing turnover, by our measure, this marked the first quarter of flat to slightly positive year-over-year category growth that we've seen in the U.S. since 2021," Chief Executive Niraj Shah told analysts on a call Tuesday.

Shares gained 18% to $105.00 in pre-market trading.

Revenue rose 7.5% to $3.52 billion. Analysts surveyed by FactSet had forecast revenue of $3.47 billion.

In the U.S., sales were up 9%, the best performance in Wayfair's post-Covid era, Shah said. It was high-earning Americans that have fueled much of this growth, Shah said, as Wayfair's luxury brands outperformed.

"In keeping with the often discussed K-shaped recovery, we saw noteworthy outperformance from both our specialty retail brands," he said.

Wayfair's upscale furnishing business Perigold saw sales increase 35% during the quarter. Perigold's customer base spends almost three times as much per year as a typical shopper on Wayfair's website, Shah said.

Wayfair's international business hasn't had quite the same turnaround as the U.S., as sales fell 1.3%.

"That macro improvement did not extend to our end markets in Canada or the U.K., which both saw continued pressure on consumer sentiment and discretionary spending," Chief Financial Officer Kate Gulliver said.

Wayfair swung to a loss of $1 million, or 1 cent a share, from a profit of $15 million, or 11 cents a share, a year earlier. Stripping out certain one-time items, adjusted per-share earnings were 95 cents, ahead of the 90 cents anticipated by analysts, according to FactSet.

In the current third quarter, Wayfair expects sales to grow by a high single-digit percentage. Management expects its gross margins in the quarter to be near the lower end of its previous guidance due to investments it is making in its loyalty program.