It is true too early to talk about Black Friday, but it’s at least objectively cooler to associate the phrase with Halloween than with Thanksgiving. So we forgive Best Buy for launching its sale a month early. Luckily, it also means you have extra time this week to score deals on a ton of electronics from the retailer.
Updated October 27, 2022: We’ve added several new offerings, like the Pixel 6A and Hisense TV.
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Phone and wearable deals
The Pixel 6A (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is our favorite Android phone. It offers many of the benefits of the high-end Pixel line – including Google’s Tensor chip, a crisp OLED display, and all the camera and AI wizardry that Google usually builds into its phones – in a much more affordable package .
This budget OnePlus phone (7/10, WIRED Recommends) offers a surprising range of features for the price, including an AMOLED (true black, vivid colors) display, all-day battery life, and excellent performance. It even includes NFC for contactless payments, a microSD card slot, and a headphone jack. OnePlus will also deliver security updates for three years. The disadvantages? It will only get Android 12 (which already makes it obsolete). It only works on T-Mobile and AT&T, and on the latter you only access 4G LTE.
It’s no surprise that the best smartwatch for iPhones is the Apple Watch. While the Series 7 (8/10, WIRED Recommends) isn’t the latest model, this discount makes it an attractive, affordable option.
Even though Google is getting into the smartwatch hardware game, Samsung still makes one of the best smartwatches for Android users at the moment. The Galaxy Watch5 (7/10, WIRED Recommends) has many fitness features on par with the Apple Watch, although some – like electrocardiogram readings – only work if you pair the Watch5 with a Samsung phone.
Laptop Deals
Apple has introduced a new design with its latest MacBook Air (7/10, WIRED Recommends), which also features the new M2 chipset. It has plenty of power for most everyday tasks, solid battery life, and a 1080p webcam. You also get a MagSafe connector so the laptop won’t fly away if you trip over the cable. It’s more expensive than its predecessor, but this discount helps fix that. Keep in mind that the chipset doesn’t allow you to connect this device to more than one external display.
This is our favorite gaming laptop when looking for the best battery life. This model is equipped with a Ryzen 7 6800H processor, 16 GB of RAM, an Nvidia RTX 3050 Ti graphics card and a 512 GB SSD. The spacious 15-inch screen is nice, as is the 120Hz refresh rate, and you can play most games at around 60fps on high settings. Read more about it in our guide to the best budget gaming laptops.
Typically, a laptop with a 16-inch screen is bulky and heavy. Not the LG Gram. It’s light and slim and doesn’t compromise on performance. This model is equipped with a 12th generation Intel Core i7 chip, 16 GB of RAM and a 1 TB SSD. It’s an excellent price for these specs. The downside is the keyboard, which doesn’t feel as satisfying to type on as it doesn’t offer a lot of key travel.
Audio Offers
These Beats headphones (8/10, WIRED Recommends) are especially good if you’re in the Apple ecosystem. They pair easily with iPhones and other Apple devices, get incredible Bluetooth range, and have at least 20 hours of battery life. Unfortunately, Android users may not enjoy the same battery life.
Our resident audiophile, Parker Hall, called the Galaxy Buds2 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) “the new standard in mid-range wireless earbuds”. They’re comfortable, with active noise cancellation and enough water resistance to get through your workout.
If your workout is more intense than the average person’s, you may prefer headphones that are designed to keep up with you. On this front, the Jabra Elite 7 Active is our favorite. In our testing, they fit people with wildly different ear sizes without falling out. They also have excellent noise cancellation and a battery life of at least eight hours.
Google may be a relative newcomer to the earbud world, but the Pixel Buds Pro (9/10, WIRED Recommends) impressed us with seven hours of playtime, intuitive touch controls, and the ability to easily switch between devices. Unfortunately, they lack some features when you use them with iPhones.
We haven’t tested this particular model, but Sony’s WH-1000XM4 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is still our top pick for wireless headphones. This model is usually a bit cheaper than other options, but today it’s downright affordable and offers many benefits of Sony’s headphone design and expertise.
Camera Deals
The GoPro Hero11 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is one of our most popular action cameras. This model adds a larger sensor, which is great for vertical video if you’re into those kinds of things, and can shoot up to 5.3K video – although you’ll need a new phone for the latter.
Sony’s A7 cameras are consistently among our top picks for most people, and while the A7 IV (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is our favorite, it’s also very expensive. However, if you don’t mind forgoing some of the newer autofocus features, the A7 III is also a good choice and it’s on sale now.
This AII kit is another step down from the A7 III (although it’s still a great camera in its own right) and comes with a 28-70mm varifocal lens. If this is your first mirrorless camera and you don’t have Sony lenses yet, this is a great place to start without spending a ton of money.
Ecosystem lock-in is real in the camera world, and if you’re a die-hard Canon fan, the EOS-R is our go-to choice for you. It’s a beefy camera, with satisfyingly machined metal parts, phase-detection autofocus, and even a handy cover that pops out to protect your sensor when you switch lenses.
Sales of Nikon gear don’t come along too often, although this is a small discount on what is arguably one of the company’s best cameras. There’s excellent dynamic range, a super-fast autofocus system and superb video quality. The user interface is intuitive and the camera feels good in your hand. The only weird thing? It uses dual interface cards: an XQD/CFexpress and an SD card.
Home Theater Deals
This Vizio M-Series soundbar (9/10, WIRED Recommends) offers the perfect balance of detailed surround sound audio without breaking the bank. We especially like this one for gaming as it makes it easy to hear the enemy sneaking around behind you.
We haven’t tested the Hisense U8H, but its predecessor, the U8G (8/10, WIRED Recommends), remains one of our favorite TVs (particularly for gamers). With this sale, the newer model’s price matches what we tested, so taking the upgrade is a no-brainer. There’s also a 55-inch model for $700.
Smart Home Offers
Google’s Nest Hub Max (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is our favorite smart display overall. It has great speakers, a spacious 10-inch touchscreen, and a camera for video calls. Google’s software can also identify specific members of the house to only show the reminders and events relevant to that person, and it even has a guest mode so other people can use it without seeing your personalized results.
If you prefer your smart display without a camera (and there are many reasons for that), the smaller 7-inch Nest Hub (7/10, Wired recommends) offers most of what the Max can do in a more affordable package. It supports gesture controls so you can pause videos with a wave of your hand, making it great in the kitchen, but it can also use radar to track your sleeping habits, making it a solid option for the bedroom too.
There’s no cheaper way to enter the Google smart home ecosystem than with the Nest Mini (7/10, WIRED Recommends). For $20 each, you could have one of these in most rooms in your house. They don’t have the robust speakers of more expensive options, but if you just need to set timers and get reminders, this is an excellent place to start.
The Nest Audio (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is what you want if your main focus is pumping music with a smart speaker. It still includes Google Assistant, so you can ask the voice assistant all sorts of questions and use it to control your smart home devices. What makes it great is its audio quality – you get powerful sound with plenty of bass. You can pair two for stereo sound.
The fourth-gen Echo (8/10, WIRED Recommends) offers a nice upgrade over the basics. It features room-filling sound, a 3.5mm output for connecting to a larger sound system, and the usual Alexa commands.
Lenovo makes some pretty awesome smart home accessories for the Google Assistant ecosystem (sometimes even prettier than Google’s own). This alarm clock is a great example. It offers a 4-inch smart display and alarm clock functions to help you wake up, and it has a place to wirelessly charge your phone at night.
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