With less than a week to go until Thanksgiving, the vision of Black Friday and Cyber Monday is also looming large, which is great news for your holidays shopping. And retailers ranging from Amazon and Adidas to Walmart and Wayfair have already reduced thousands of prices online.
Black Friday has arrived — albeit unofficially — which means the annual race for discount TVs and reduced games consoles isn't far away either.
Black Friday 2021 itself is set for the day after Thanksgiving, Friday, November 26, with Cyber Monday following immediately after the weekend. But realistically, late November has turned into one elongated online sales event, with retailers the world over slashing prices and taking advantage of the post-Thanksgiving holiday and pre-Christmas gift buying frenzy.
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The sheer number of stores that have already gone live with their sales is too long to list here, but among them are:
Amazon: early Black Friday deals in pretty much every shopping category you can imagine
Best Buy: some of the most eye-catching offers we've seen, especially on TVs and other tech
Walmart: sales already started, but wait until Monday for even more discounts
Home Depot: big savings to be had on smart home products, electronics, and garden furniture
Target: 50% weighted blanket sale has proved popular, with discounts on hundreds more products
Lowe's: big discounts include home appliances, tool kits and Christmas decorations
Nordstrom: fashion, home, and beauty are the focus of this year's sale, with half price on many items
Wayfair: get up to 80% off across the online store
Samsung: Samsung's superb smartphones have $100s of dollars off
HP: save on printers, laptops, and accessories with HP's big 49% discount offer
Dell: hundreds of dollars' worth of discounts including on some of the world's best laptops
Nike: trainers, t-shirts, leisurewear, activewear, and much more included in sale
Nectar: award winning mattresses delivered to your door for as little as $499
Saatva: 15% off mattresses sitewide including store's Black Friday Price Match Guarantee
Mixbook: big savings across personalized photo books, cards, calendars, and other gifts
Unless you know exactly what you want to buy, however, that could mean a lot of clicking and scrolling to find a deal that stands out to you. You also have to be mindful of marketing spiel and bluster ... not all the offers out there are quite as good as the stores make out.
We've taken a look ourselves and have picked out the top 10 early Black Friday deals that have really caught our eye and are worth a second look. We'll be updating this page regularly as we head towards Black Friday and Cyber Monday themselves, so feel free to bookmark the page and check back often for the latest discounts.
(Image credit: Courtesy Walmart)
APPLE AIRPODS PRO HEADPHONES: $189 AT BEST BUY
Best Buy has undercut the rest on a product that we expect to be a big hit for Christmas stockings this year yet again. Just don't forget that you can get the previous generation of AirPods for about half this price, and they're still really good headphones.
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AMAZON FIRE TV STICK 4K STREAMER: $24.99 AT AMAZON
Outside of Amazon Prime Day, Black Friday and Cyber Monday are always the best opportunity to buy Amazon's own proprietary devices on the cheap. We've waited a whole year for the 4K version of its Fire Stick to hit this rock bottom price again.
Coffee makers have been a Black Friday battleground for the last few years, and even around this time of year the prices can be eye-watering. But this pod-model from the reliable Keurig is about as affordable as they come.
If your blow-out Black Friday 2021 purchase is going to be a TV and you want to go big, then you'll struggle to find a better value option than this 4K Toshiba that spans 65". Yes, there are better TVs out there, but it's that price and size combo that catches the eye here and this is the lowest price we've ever seen it.
In the lead up to Black Friday 2021, the newest edition of the Microsoft Surface Pro has been one of the best sellers so far. This model has 128GB SSD storage, 4GB Ram, and attractive 12.3" touchscreen.
Another market-leading product, this laptop comes Windows 11-ready and is ideal for streamers, professionals, and regular home users. This price point is unheard of for the Dell XPS 13, and we'd be surprised if stocks last through until Thanksgiving.
Now superseded by a newer model, the Apple Watch 6 is still a fantastic purchase and is falling in price. It's fully-functioned with GPS, lets you take calls and reply to messages, is jam-packed with health and biometric tools and has a battery life of up to 18 hours. At the time of writing, only the red and blue models are on sale.
IROBOT ROOMBA 692 VACUUM CLEANER: $199.99 AT AMAZON
Automatic, smart vacuum cleaners aren't going to be for everybody, but the technology is getting better and better, and iRobot Roombas are leading the way. This one is the brand's best seller, combining affordability with voice activation and smart AI. Worth keeping an eye on, as it did come down another $20 this time last year.
PHILLIPS SONICARE FLEXCARE TOOTHBRUSH: $119.99 at AMAZON
The Phillips Sonicare range invariably features in lists of the best electric toothbrushes, and the Flexcare Platinum is down to its lowest price ever. This is truly a 21st century toothbrush, featuring Bluetooth technology that connects to a dedicated app to help you maximise your dental health.
LEGO HARRY POTTER ADVENT CALENDAR: $31.99 AT TARGET
The total saving on this fun Harry Potter-themed advent calendar may not be as hefty as on some of the products above, but does make a clever alternative to more traditional calendars. There's Lego pieces behind all of the 24 doors, with your kids' favorite characters all included, too.
The origins of the expression "Black Friday" can be tracked back to early as the 1960s, but really came to prominence at the start of this century as a key shopping day in the United States. The day after Thanksgiving each year, it has long been an opportune time for Americans to carry out holiday shopping. More recently, the concept of Black Friday as a day for retailers to drop their prices has caught on the world over.
WHAT IS CYBER MONDAY?
Cyber Monday — a term coined in 2005 — is the Monday immediately following Black Friday, so this year it falls on November 29. To begin with, it was generally targeted by online retailers as an opportunity to extend their sales. In recent years, the distinction between Black Friday and Cyber Monday has blurred, with most key stores hosting sales throughout. In fact, it is not uncommon for retailers to have Cyber Week or even Cyber Month discounts.
Adam Marshall has written about tech, lifestyle, and software for titles such as TechRadar, Tom's Guide, T3, and Creative Bloq. Among his professional and personal interests are cinema, sport, culture, and TV. A law graduate from the U.K., Adam also has a history as a practicing lawyer and a tech product researcher.
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