There are red hot deals on the best steam irons you can buy right now

(Image credit: Philips)

published 3 February 2020

Looking for a great deal on a steam iron? No, okay, it's probably not something you woke up this morning yearning for. However, if you must iron clothes, you want the best steam iron for the job, but that can mean major expense these days. Because we're not talking about any old irons, here: these are serious bits of fabric-flattening kit.

If you haven't purchased an iron recently – perhaps you're still using the calcium-choked, £20 one you bought at uni, you big skank – you may be surprised by what they look like, and what they can do nowadays.

Philips makes the best irons available to humankind, and its steam irons and steam generators – essentially an iron with a huge, pumped, external water tank – look like something out of Star Trek: Discovery. They are also so powerful and so clever, they almost make ironing fun. Almost.

If you take a look at our buying guide for irons, you'll see in black and white that the Philips PerfectCare Elite GC9630/20 is The Best Steam Generator. However it has an RRP of £350, which you might find off-putting. Not today, though…

• Buy Philips PerfectCare Elite GC9630/20 for £200 – save £150

If that's still a bit much, we also highly rate Philips' Azur line of steam irons, and this one is a steal today.

• Buy Philips Azur steam iron GC4567/86 for £55 – ~~was £90~~ – save £35

• Shop all today's Amazon Philips iron deals

With a 250g steam boost and a silky smooth face plate that glides across your fabrics, the Azur is a great buy for £55. Especially as it makes removing limescale deposits incredibly easy. However, the PerfectCare Elite is some whole next-level grooming solution. It has no temperature dial, is completely safe on all fabrics – due to science or witchcraft, you can actually leave it on top of silk or polyester and it will not burn – and has a huge water/steam tank that delivers a pulsating 470g steam boost when the going gets tough.

There are also deals on Philips (and Braun) electric razors today

Why you should buy Philips PerfectCare Elite GC9630/20

Key features one temperature, auto steam, easy descale
Tank capacity 1.8 litres
Continuous steam 135g/min
Steam boost 470g

This premium steam generator has been around long enough to a) prove its longevity and b) start getting price cuts. Philips' PerfectCare system means there is no temperature dial; it just flattens anything from wool, silk or man-made fibres to heavyweight cotton, without you having to fiddle with anything. As it also cannot burn fabrics, it's literally idiot-proof, in fact. Easy De-Calc Plus is a quick and easy way to remove limescale.

We've been using one of these for years and it has made our ironing duties considerably more tolerable. You do need a fairly large space to store it away but other than that, the Philips PerfectCare Elite GC9630/20 is hard to fault, especially at this much reduced price.

Duncan is the former lifestyle editor of T3 and has been writing about tech for almost 15 years. He has covered everything from smartphones to headphones, TV to AC and air fryers to the movies of James Bond and obscure anime. His current brief is everything to do with the home and kitchen, which is good because he is an excellent cook, if he says so himself. He also covers cycling and ebikes – like over-using italics, this is another passion of his. In his long and varied lifestyle-tech career he is one of the few people to have been a fitness editor despite being unfit and a cars editor for not one but two websites, despite being unable to drive. He also has about 400 vacuum cleaners, and is possibly the UK's leading expert on cordless vacuum cleaners, despite being decidedly messy. A cricket fan for over 30 years, he also recently become T3's cricket editor, writing about how to stream obscure T20 tournaments, and turning out some typically no-nonsense opinions on the world's top teams and players.

Before T3, Duncan was a music and film reviewer, worked for a magazine about gambling that employed a surprisingly large number of convicted criminals, and then a magazine called Bizarre that was essentially like a cross between Reddit and DeviantArt, before the invention of the internet. There was also a lengthy period where he essentially wrote all of T3 magazine every month for about 3 years.

A broadcaster, raconteur and public speaker, Duncan used to be on telly loads, but an unfortunate incident put a stop to that, so he now largely contents himself with telling people, "I used to be on the TV, you know."