Amazon Prime Day 2020: The best deals, plus everything you need to know ahead of October 13-14

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Prime Day Date 2020 4x3 — Amazon Prime Day 2020 will start on Tuesday, October 13 and run through Wednesday, October 14.

Alyssa Powell/Business Insider

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It’s official: Amazon Prime Day 2020 will start on Tuesday, October 13, and run through Wednesday, October 14. Amazon says the much anticipated 48-hour event will feature more than one million deals.

However, shoppers don’t need to wait until mid-October to take advantage of several early Amazon Prime Day deals on services and products. In fact, there are a number of bonus credit opportunities are available for those ready to start shopping now.

For anyone who’s unfamiliar, the annual retail event is exclusively for Amazon’s 150 million Prime members. Luckily for those who aren’t already members, we’re currently in the window where it’s safe to sign up for the 30-day free trial and take advantage of the early and day-of Prime Day deals and skip paying for the subscription cost.

Typically, the event prominently features deals on Amazon’s own devices and private labels. Deals on headphones, speakers, laptops, 4K TVs, and small kitchen appliances like the Instant Pot also abound.

Quick link: You’ll find all of Amazon’s Prime Day deals, including early deals, on this landing page.

Some of the best early Prime Day deals you can get right now include:

Amazon Music Unlimited: four months for $1
Audible Premium Plus: save $50 on an annual subscription
Kindle Unlimited: save 50% on a six-month subscription
Get a $10 credit to use on Prime Day when you spend $10 on items sold by small businesses before October 12
Buy two 3rd Gen Echo Dot devices for $40

What is Amazon Prime Day?

Introduced in 2015 in part to celebrate Amazon’s 20th anniversary, the first Amazon Prime Day was a one-day-only retail holiday for Prime members that sought to overtake Black Friday as the sales event of the year.

During the event, prices drop to all-time lows, often beating out prices we see over Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The sale covers every product category Amazon offers: tech, beauty, home and kitchen, fashion, and smart home are just a few of the huge variety of items that will be discounted.

Last year’s Amazon Prime Day was a huge success; during the 48-hour sale event held on July 15-16, Prime members bought more than 175 million items. It was the biggest shopping day in company history until it was surpassed by Cyber Monday shortly after, a familiar pattern of record-breaking.

When is Amazon Prime Day?

This year, Amazon Prime Day 2020 will start on Tuesday, October 13, and run through Wednesday, October 14.

Shoppers, however, don’t need to wait until then to take advantage of deals. Prime members can shop early deals and offers leading up to Prime Day. In addition to markdowns on Amazon devices, like select Fire TVs and the Fire TV Recast, Prime members can enjoy discounts on subscriptions to Audible, Amazon Music Unlimited or Kindle Unlimited, Amazon Fresh, plus several Amazon brands, like GoodThreads, Solimo, and more.

Prime members in the following countries can participate in the event: the US, UK, UAE, Spain, Singapore, Netherlands, Mexico, Luxembourg, Japan, Italy, Germany, France, China, Canada, Belgium, Austria, Australia, and — for the first time this year — Turkey and Brazil.

Was Amazon Prime Day postponed this year?

Prime Day in past years has always taken place during the summer, specifically in July. Due to recent supply-chain delays and increased demand related to the novel coronavirus pandemic, Amazon has pushed Prime Day 2020 to October 13-14.

Who can access Prime Day deals?

Only Amazon Prime members can take advantage of this event. Signing up is easy though, and a membership comes with many more benefits than just Prime Day deals access and free two-day shipping.

New members can sign up for a free 30-day trial with full benefits before committing, so if you’re not yet a member, we recommend timing your enrollment to overlap with October 13-14 to get Prime Day access, free.

Do other stores take part in Amazon Prime Day?

While other retailers don’t advertise taking part in Prime Day, we expect to see large retailers like Walmart and Best Buy offer sales with competitive pricing during and around the event. However, the volume and quality of these competitor deals are up in the air, as the postponement of Prime Day 2020 has left us very close to Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

At the time of writing, only Target has confirmed a competing sales event. Target’s ‘Deal Days’ event will offer shoppers “double the deals compared to last year” between October 13-14. As with Amazon Prime Day, Target will offer “early-bird deals” ahead of ‘Deal Days’ plus exclusive discounts for Target Circle members.

We’ll be covering the best deals from Target and all retailers we trust during Prime Day, just as we do during the rest of the year.

How will this Prime Day be different from years past?

With Prime Day happening so close to Black Friday this year, competing sales and the number of overall deals will most likely be fewer in number.

Rival retailers may do as little as match Amazon’s discounts on Amazon products, like Kindles and Echo speakers, and a few high-demand products, like Sony headphones or gaming consoles. Instead, other big-box stores, like Walmart and Best Buy, may wait until Black Friday and Cyber Monday to offer sitewide markdowns.

The larger ripple we expect to see this Amazon Prime Day is less available stock and potentially delayed shipping. Shipping speeds often take a hit during these high-traffic events, and we expect it to be worse than in years past.

With supply chains still not back up to snuff since prior to the pandemic, high-demand items like webcams, home office furniture, brand-name hand sanitizers, workout equipment, sewing machines, and the like will probably run out quickly, if they’re in stock at all.

How do I prepare for Amazon Prime Day?

With Prime Day happening mid-October, it’s time to ensure your Prime Member status. Or, if you’re not currently a Prime member, you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.

You can also prepare by reading up on everything Prime Day-related to learn about what types of deals to expect and how to shop special promotions like Lightning Deals.

We recommend holding off on buying Amazon devices and services until October 13-14, if you can. While we also expect other smart home brands to drop in price considerably, brands like Kindle and Echo are our for-sure bet to drop in price. We also recommend waiting to sign up for any Amazon services or memberships, like Amazon Music Unlimited or Kindle Unlimited, as they often drop down to record-breaking lows during Prime Day.

This year, Amazon is offering a $10 credit to use on Prime Day when you spend $10 on items from select small businesses spotlighted by Amazon through October 12.

If one of the products on your wish list didn’t receive a discount during Prime Day — don’t immediately surrender to the retail price. In a little more than a month after Prime Day, Black Friday and Cyber Monday may offer the discount you were hoping for.

Which is better for deals: Prime Day or Black Friday?

2020 has been an unprecedented year for deals events, so making solid predictions based on past years is somewhat difficult. However, we can expect Amazon-branded merchandise (e.g., Kindle, Echo, Ring, etc.) to be at all-time lows during Prime Day, the company’s own event.

We could speculate for days whether or not retailers will be able to offer equally jaw-dropping prices as past years, but with the delays in supply chains and shipping, and demand increases, prices this year between either Prime Day or Black Friday may not be as great as in past years (if there’s even enough stock).

Will Amazon’s new devices announced in September go on sale on Prime Day?

Amazon products see markdowns every week, and Prime Day will unlikely be an exception. With Prime Day happening so close to the holiday season, it’s more than a possibility that Amazon will drop prices on the latest generation of Echo devices, released September 24.

In fact, it’s not out of the realm of possibility to see discounts on Ring, eero, and Echo devices during the lead up to Prime Day. For what it’s worth, Amazon’s new eero 6 mesh WiFi system bundled with an Echo Dot and two Philips Hue bulbs is currently offered at an $80 discount, and a two-pack of the latest Echo Dots can be yours for $20 less with the code DOT2PACK.

What kinds of deals will I find during Prime Day?

A huge variety of products will be discounted during the event. You’ll find all of Amazon’s Prime Day deals on this Amazon page once the event begins, but here are some deals we expect to see come out in droves:

Early Amazon Prime Day deals

In the days and weeks leading up to Prime Day, Amazon typically rolls out exclusive promotions and deals on Amazon devices like Echo smart speakers and Kindle readers, and services like Kindle Unlimited. Outside of Black Friday, Amazon Prime Day is when we see the steepest discounts on these items. If you’re looking for Prime Day deals you can take advantage of right now, Amazon’s daily deals page is one to bookmark and check every morning. Below, check out some of the best early Prime Day deals on Amazon available now.

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