Friday, March 29, 2024

Best Prime Day Laptop Deals 2020: What to expect

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Prime Day is coming a bit late this year. Normally held during the summer, Amazon’s big yearly blowout sale was delayed due to ongoing public health concerns; now, shoppers will instead get to jump on all those great Prime Day bargains in October. Better still, it looks like this year’s Prime Day will last even longer than usual if rumors are true, giving you more time to save. Prime Day is arguably the best day aside from Black Friday to find huge discounts on big-ticket items, too, so if it’s time for a new PC, then we’re going to be rounding up all the best Prime Day laptop deals right here — including some early ones that inevitably appear in the run-up to the big day.

When are the best Prime Day laptop deals?

The bulk of the Prime Day laptop deals will naturally be up for grabs during the sale itself; however, Amazon always likes to tease shoppers with some early discounts in the week leading up to the event. If you see a laptop deal that sings to you in this “pre-sale” week, don’t hold off on buying it thinking that there will be a better discount come Prime Day — there’s no guarantee that you’ll see it again for the same price (let alone a better one) or that it will even be on sale again at all. Also, if you do see it cheaper during Prime Day, you can always return it and buy it again for the lower price.

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Another thing to remember with Prime Day — and this is especially important for new Prime members who haven’t shopped this sale before — is that even if the event itself lasts for a couple of days or more, the deals almost never do. A lot of Lightning Deals will be happening, and these typically run for 24 hours or until they sell out (which usually happens first), while the best bargains may only be up for a few hours until they all get snatched up. Amazon limits the availability of its Prime Day laptop deals, so don’t hesitate if you see one that’s right for you.

What Prime Day laptop deals to expect

Though it is limited to Prime members, Prime Day is arguably the best sale of the year — other than Black Friday, of course — for finding deep discounts on pricey electronics like computers. Prime Day laptop deals also provide a great opportunity to look for deals on things that don’t often go on sale for huge price cuts, such as MacBooks, so Mac people would do well to keep an eye out for those.

Of course, the vast majority of Prime Day laptop deals will be for Windows PCs and Chromebooks (for the simple reason that there is a much wider variety of these than there are MacBooks), so if you’re after something like a 2-in-1 ultrabook, gaming laptop, or just a cheap workhorse computer, we expect plenty of those to be on offer. The biggest discounts will likely be reserved for slightly older last-generation models from 2018 or 2019, but those Lightning Deals also feature some newer stuff at the lowest prices you’ll see all year. If you see one of those, act fast — they won’t last long.

How to choose a new laptop

Laptops aren’t small purchases, and considering that we use our computers almost every day for work, shopping, learning, entertainment, and staying in touch with friends and loved ones, you certainly want to find one that meets your needs (although Amazon’s generous return policy helps to ensure you don’t get stuck with a laptop that’s a bad fit). When you’re shopping through the Prime Day laptop deals, don’t get too excited and jump on the first one you see that catches your eye and meets your budget; do some research before the sale starts to narrow down the field a bit and dial-in the specific features and specs you’re looking for.

Laptops obviously dominate the modern PC market, and in 2020, you’ve got quite a few more designs to choose from than you did even five years ago. Along with traditional laptops, you’ll also see featherweight ultrabooks, 2-in-1 convertibles, gaming machines, MacBooks, and Chromebooks among the many types of laptops out there today. On top of that variety, there are a bunch of different specifications and features to sort through — CPUs, RAM, storage space, display sizes and resolutions, graphics processors — all of these are important considerations when determining what sort of laptop suits your own needs best.

If you’re like most people, then a standard laptop may be enough to meet your requirements, but you’ll want to make sure you get one that has relatively recent hardware: We recommend 9th- and 10th-gen Intel Core or AMD Ryzen CPUs, along with at least 8GB of RAM and preferably a solid-state drive. For things like gaming and video editing, you’ll also want to look for Prime Day laptop deals on PCs featuring discrete graphics cards like the newer Nvidia GTX 16- and 20-series (the older 10-series GeForce GPUs are a little long in the tooth in 2020).

If you want something a little more bleeding-edge, then you may want to consider a 2-in-1 laptop or even a traditional design that implements a touchscreen. This gives you a little more versatility than a standard laptop, and a 2-in-1 convertible with a fold-flat touch display (especially one that includes its own stylus so you don’t have to purchase one separately) is an especially good choice for artists and graphic designers.

It’s important to set your budget and figure out what sort of laptop you want (maybe even pick out a few specific models you really like) before the sale so that you won’t miss out on that perfect bargain by hesitating too long. Even if the product page shows that you have plenty of time left, these Prime Day laptop deals usually sell out well before that time limit — but be sure to do some quick price comparisons with other websites to make sure it’s actually a good discount. If its an official Prime Day deal offered by Amazon and not a third-party seller, however, you can usually be certain that it’s a worthwhile pick.

We strive to help our readers find the best deals on quality products and services, and we choose what we cover carefully and independently. The prices, details, and availability of the products and deals in this post may be subject to change at anytime. Be sure to check that they are still in effect before making a purchase.Digital Trends may earn commission on products purchased through our links, which supports the work we do for our readers.

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