Amazon’s Prime Day is almost here – the shopping event will take place on July 11th and 12th. However, if you already have Prime, you can go with these early Prime Day deals.
Note that we tried to find the same product in the US, UK and Germany, however, discounts vary by region – sometimes there are no discounts at all.
And we’ve broken things down into categories: tablets, e-readers, speakers, streaming devices, TVs, and Wi-Fi routers.
Tablets
Amazon’s Fire tablets are the cheapest Android tablets you’ll find, at least with a recognizable brand name. They have an Amazon-specific setup, but if you catch our drift, it’s pretty easy to change.
The Amazon Fire HD 10.1” tablet from 2021 has a 1,920 x 1,200px display and dual speakers (plus a 3.5mm jack). With 12 hours of battery life, these are great for streaming, but you can also do some light gaming with the octa-core CPU and half-decent GPU.
If you prefer, you may want to pick up the Fire HD 10 Plus model with an extra gig of RAM. It supports 15W wireless charging (mainly intended for use with an optional dock).
Unsurprisingly, the new Fire Max 11 tablet isn’t part of the Prime Day promotions. It’s easily the best of the bunch – and it’s priced accordingly. This 11” tablet has a 2,000 x 1,200px display, a powerful chipset (MediaTek MTK8188J) with 4GB of RAM and 64/128GB of storage and a battery life of up to 14 hours.
If you want something cheaper, there’s the Fire HD 8, but only the US branch offers a good discount. This 2022 model has a 6-core CPU and a 1,280 x 800px screen, so it’s not the best hardware, but it might be the best hardware $55 can buy.
E-readers
The Kindle Oasis has a 7” 300ppi display (compared to 6.8” 300ppi on the Paperwhite) with adjustable warm light. It is IPX8 water resistant and has physical side-turning buttons. Also, it’s the only model with free cellular connectivity, so you can download new books on the go at no extra charge.
The Kindle Scribe is an interesting one, but unfortunately Amazon doesn’t offer Prime deals on it (not yet, at least). It’s the largest e-reader in the family with a 10.2” display (300ppi) and it gets its name because of the stylus support – it can be your digital notebook or sketchbook. And for $30 more you can get a premium pen, with a virtual eraser and shortcut button on the other end.
By the way, there is a Kindle Paperwhite Kids Edition. It comes with an ad-free 1-year subscription to Kids+, which gives you free access to a wide variety of books. Some popular titles include the Harry Potter and Artemis Fowl books.
Speakers
Depending on your smart home setup, you can control many electronics in your home with Amazon Alexa, and Echo speakers are an easy way to achieve that.
Starting with the basic Echo Dot and Echo Dot with Clock, these offer decent audio quality on a budget.
There’s also the Echo Dot Kids, which comes with a free year of Kids+ — similar to the Kindle offering, except with audible audiobooks. There are also interactive sound-based games and some educational features.
The Echo Link Amp is an easy way to turn a pair of old bookshelf speakers into smart speakers that support Amazon Music HD/Spotify/Apple Music and streaming from your phone (via Casting or via Bluetooth). This amp can drive two 60W speakers (there’s also an output for a powered subwoofer). It has optical and analog out and an Ethernet port (in addition to Wi-Fi).
At the other end of the scale is the Echo Pop, which is a cheaper speaker than the Dots, but has a slightly larger driver (1.95″ vs. 1.73″).
For high-quality audio, but without connecting external speakers, the Echo Studio has Dolby Atmos support and can create immersive soundscapes with its multiple speakers – a 1.2″ tweeter, three 2″ mid-range speakers and a 5.3″ woofer.
Streaming
Turn off the audio and switch to TV streaming. The Fire TV Stick 4K is an inexpensive way to add 4K streaming to an older TV. It supports all major services and Dolby Vision and HDR10+ and Dolby Atmos for audio.
For a bit more you can get the Fire TV Stick 4K Max instead – Amazon claims its chipset is 40% more powerful and (most importantly) has Wi-Fi 6 connectivity (versus Wi-Fi 5 on the other 4K Stick). If you’re wondering why you need a faster chipset, remember that these can also run games.
The Fire TV Cube is the top of the line model – it’s twice as powerful as the 4K Max Stick and has faster Wi-Fi 6E support. It has a built-in mic and speaker, so it replaces the Echo Dot as well.
If you’ve lost or broken the remote that came with the sticks and cube, here’s a replacement. In fact, it’s an Alexa Voice Remote Pro with customizable and backlit buttons.
Then there’s the Fire TV Blaster — it’s like your TV’s remote, but it’s controlled by Alexa. This device has a built-in infrared blaster, so it can control your entire system: TV, cable box, A/V receiver, and more.
televisions
Why not skip the middle man and get a TV with fire features? We should also note that these are very cheap for their size – there are 43″, 50″ and 55″ options. They support HDR10 and have one HDMI 2.1 and three HDMI 2.0 ports with eARC.
Wi-Fi routers
Amazon’s Eero routers can cover even large, multi-story buildings with their Wi-Fi mesh. There’s the eero 6+, which has Wi-Fi 6 connectivity and one unit is enough for an area of 140 square meters/1,500 square feet. Amazon sells them in 2, 3 and 4 packs.
For better range and faster speeds, the eero Pro 6E comes with Wi-Fi 6E, and a router with an area of 190 sq m/2,000 sq ft. These are also available in packs of 2 or 3, a go if you want to mesh. The Pro 6E has two Ethernet ports, one 2.5Gb and one 1Gb, while the non-Pro model has a pair of gigabit ports. Also, the Wi-Fi 6E operates on the 6GHz band, which can help if the 5GHz band in your space is crowded.
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