Amazon Prime Day 2022 is no doubt already on secret internal calendars at Amazon HQ but while we have no official info on the annual event yet, we've been covering Amazon sales at T3 for over six years and so we can make already make some predictions about Prime Day 2022.
Amazon Prime Day 2021 took place over two days last June with the 48-hour period seeing the best deals matching or beating previous Prime Day sale prices. Now we can look ahead to Prime Day 2022, starting with that all-important question, when is it?
While we know Amazon Prime Day is set for a July time frame this year, almost two months after Memorial Day sales, it's still up in the air as to exactly what dates it falls on. Until then, however, we'll keep a close eye for any news and updates regarding Prime Day 2022.
When is Amazon Prime Day 2022?
In a recent press release detailing Amazon's first quarter results for 2022, Amazon sneakily threw in that Prime Day 2022 will be happening sometime in July. This follows suit from Prime Day 2021, where it kicked off on Monday the 11th.
We estimated that a date for Amazon Prime Day in 2022 would be somewhere around the same as last years date. Since May 11th does indeed fall on a Monday again this year, it's a very real chance we'll see Amazon Prime Day kick off on the same date and time, possibly running from Monday, July 11, through Tuesday, July 12.
Starting at a minute past midnight PST (3:01 am EST) on the Monday and finishing on Tuesday at 11:59 pm PST (2:59 am EST Wednesday), so like last year it'll be a 48-hour event (minus two minutes).
In 2021, Amazon held its Prime Day sale on Monday, June 21 and Tuesday, June 22, but this is actually a full month earlier than the usual time frame. It's a safe bet that we can expect Prime Day to return to July next year, but who knows at this point!
While it was initially suggested that Prime Day would return to a July timeframe in 2021, a comment from the CFO during a quarterly earnings report this year led many to believe it would be held earlier. That turned out to be very right, with Prime Day 2021 being bumped up a full month ahead of schedule.
Amazon has also been toying with the idea of adding an additional sale day later in the year, similar to Amazon Prime Day, yet held around the time of Black Friday. Two Amazon Prime Day sales in a single year? They just may be the ones crazy enough to do it!
- Don't want to wait? Browse today's deals at Amazon.com
That mid-July date prediction is echoed by a report at Digital Commerce 360 which cites an announcement from Amazon to sellers who use the Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) service. The post is titled "Plan your shipment early for Prime Day 2022" and it says that sellers have until 29 April to submit their deals for Prime Day consideration. It also says: "Plan and send your shipment so that it arrives at fulfillment centers before June 20."
The Digital Commerce 360 report quotes Fahim Naim from ecommerce consulting agency Advantage Unified Commerce as saying: "Barring any major any setback, and based on the data and the timing of the information on Seller Central, all the stars are lining up for July 11 or 18." The same report says it is "extremely unlikely" Amazon Prime Day will be on the first Monday in July which is Independence Day in the US. Naim gives 11 July a 70% probability rating, and 18 July a 30% probability.
What to expect of Amazon Prime Day 2022
Since Amazon offers fairly similar deals and offers each year, guesstimating just what deals we'll see isn't quite as difficult as many may think. Below are the deals Amazon announced ahead of Prime Day 2021. While many are no longer available, they can give us a pretty good idea of what we can expect to see on sale come Prime Day 2022.
Amazon Devices: Ring Video Doorbells starting at $44.99 with discounts on battery packs as well as eero mesh routers.
Fashion: Save up to 20% on Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger apparel, and find additional savings on men’s and women’s active wear from Amazon brands.
Health & Wellness: Save 20% on healthcare products from Amazon Basic Care along with wellness and personal care products from other Amazon brands, including Solimo, Revly, and Amazon Elements. Save on 23andMe Personal Genetic Service DNA Test Kits.
Pets: Save on Friends Forever Orthopedic Dog Beds and 20% on pet supplies from Solimo.
Toys: Save on select Green Toys, Calico Critters, and Thames & Kosmos products.
Electronics: Save 72% on the Norton 360 Deluxe and get a $10 Amazon Gift Card; up to 50% on select Xbox and Ubisoft titles, up to 30% off Amazon Basics
Kitchen: Save on Ninja blenders and coffee makers as well as the Anova Culinary Sous Vide Precision Cooker Pro.
Home: Save on select vacuums, air purifiers, irons, steamers, and fans, as well as dehumidifiers from iRobot, Bissell, Toshiba, Levoit, Black & Decker, and more.
Household Essentials: Save 20% on household essentials from Amazon brands, including Solimo and Presto!
Home Improvement: Save on select Moen kitchen and bathroom fixtures, Makita tools, and Kasa smart light switches, as well as CRAFTSMAN 20V lithium ion and Duracell batteries.
Grocery: Save up to 30% on candy and gum, and 20% on snacks and grocery products from Amazon brands, including Happy Belly and Amazon Fresh.
Sports & Outdoors: Buy one, get one 20% off World Famous Sports camping equipment.
Amazon Launchpad: Save up to 50% on the Kids Against Maturity Combo Pack and $80 on the Tertill Weeding Robot Bundle.
Panera Bread: Panera is fueling Prime Day shoppers with a sweet (and savory) deal. Prime members who sign up for MyPanera rewards will get a $3 shopping credit and 40% off their Panera online order on Prime Day.
Amazon Prime Day News & Updates
5/3 – In a recent press release, the Amazon Prime Day date was confirmed for a July time frame. While were predicting a mid-July window, Amazon's press release narrows the possible date range even further.
What were 2021's best Prime Day deals?
Of all the deals available over Prime Day 2021, some of the biggest discounts were unsurprisingly on Amazon's own devices. While the top selling product this year was the Fire TV Stick 4K, some other popular deals included price drops on Echo devices, Halo bands, Luna controllers, Fire TVs, Fire tablets, Kindles, Eero Wi-Fi spots, Blink security cameras and Ring doorbell cameras.
However, as expected PS5 and Xbox Series X games saw a huge surge this year thanks to some pretty tasty discounts. The latest generation of consoles unfortunately have had a bit of a gaming drought, but Prime Day gaming deals on some of the latest titles made it a bit easier to jump into something new.
Prime member rewards
In 2021, Amazon had a few extra incentives and rewards for Prime members including extra cashback rewards on select Prime Card purchases, increased discounts on select products and more.
For Prime Card holders, there were a few different offers to take advantage of during Prime Day 2021:
- 10% back on select LG and Sony 4K TVs
- 10% back on select Small Business brands
- 6% back on Amazon.com purchases
- 6% back on Whole Foods Market purchases
Each year it seems Amazon changes these rewards up, so while we can expect to see something similar during Prime Day 2022 it's hard to predict what they'll be. Prime Card holders got a bit more love this, as 10% cash back is a pretty large sum of money to get returns on.
Prime Day free product giveaway
Prime members who spent their time on Instagram were able to win free daily prizes including Canon digital cameras, movie projectors, Amazon gift cards and more.
Each day, Amazon had a different prize available which required no purchases for a chance to win. The Amazon Photos Giveaway landing page listed all the prizes available, and there were some pretty tantalizing wins.
Note that the giveaway is officially over and Amazon is no longer taking entries. Expect a very similar contest next year though through some form of social media.
Giving back on Amazon Prime Day
During Prime Day 2021, Amazon’s charity initiative AmazonSmile offered Prime members the opportunity to double their donation rate (1% instead of 0.5%) to the charity of their choice throughout the entire 48-hour event.
For Prime members who activated AmazonSmile via app, there was even more to gain for charities. AmazonSmile also donated 5% of the net purchase price (10X the regular rate) on the first qualifying AmazonSmile purchase on Prime Day. This special rate was for every Prime member who activated AmazonSmile in their Amazon App from 2nd June through the end of Prime Day 2021 on 22nd June.
What is Amazon Prime Day?
Amazon Prime Day is the second largest sales day of the year (next to Black Friday), and is a two day sale that offers one of the largest selections of discounted products and deals all year. While Prime Day has become somewhat of a "Black Friday" type savings event, it's a sale that tends to focus more around Prime Day devices, smart tech and Amazon brands.
There are, however, supposed to be over 2 million individual products going on sale this Prime Day. So while the focus of what you'll see when browsing Prime Day deals is turned squarely on Amazon's line of products, just about everything you can think of gets a discount during the two day event.
Is Prime free on Prime Day?
If you have not had an Amazon Prime account before then, yes, you can get a free Prime trial for Prime Day (or for any other day). Amazon offers all customers a free 30-day trial of Prime, while students get a massively generous six-month free Prime trial. You can cancel at any time during the trial and you won't be charged a thing.
If you decide to pay for Prime once your trial ends, that'll cost you $119 a year. Student Prime accounts cost just $6.49 a month.
If you live in a household where someone else has a Prime account then you can form an Amazon Household and share some of their Prime benefits at no cost to yourself – including unlimited one-day delivery plus same-day delivery in eligible areas, and access to those all-important Prime Day deals. It also provided a 30-minute early access to Lightning Deals with Prime Early Access.
Here's how to get your free Prime account and how to set up an Amazon Household.
Is the Amazon Prime price going up this year?
It has recently been confirmed that an Amazon Prime price increase is indeed happening this year. While this comes as some unwanted news for many, the 17% price bump is the third increase since Prime's inception.
You can still lock in the current price ratings before the hike later this year, but you'll want to head over to the Amazon Prime sign up page today. You can also try it out for 30 days before you make the decision of keeping it, but if you're like us (and the millions of Prime members out there) you'll most likely keep it. The benefits of the service still outweigh the cost in our minds, and while we don't like seeing the price of something go up Amazon Prime is something that offers a plethora of benefits for the price.
The price increases are as follows:
- Yearly: $139 (was $119)
- Monthly: $14.99 (was $12.99)
In an earnings call last October Amazon said it had nothing to announce around Prime price increases. However, some analysts speculated that there could be an Amazon Prime price increase on the way. As reported by MarketWatch, analysts at Jefferies reckoned a price hike was due this year, pointing out that Amazon increased the Prime membership price in March 2014 and May 2018. The same report adds that analysts at JPMorgan also believed that a price increase for Amazon services, including Prime, is coming.
"Increasing the fee again this year seems reasonable and would maintain the latest cadence of about four years," the report quotes the Jefferies analysts as saying, adding that both previous increases were by $20.
Is Amazon Prime Day happening in Canada and India?
Prime Day did not take place in June 2021 in Canada or India due to the Covid-19 situation. Amazon confirmed to CNBC that it is pausing the event in both countries. It did not provide a rescheduled date. In the same report, CNBC said that Amazon confirmed that Prime Day will continue on schedule in the UK, US, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Spain, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Netherlands, Mexico, Luxembourg, Japan, Italy, Germany, France, China, Brazil, Belgium, Austria and Australia.
How to find the best Prime Day deals
Shopping Amazon Prime Day can be an exhausting and overwhelming experience if you aren't prepared for what's ahead. While Prime Day is some of the most fun deal hunters will have all year, it can easily go bad if you aren't sure what of to look for – or how to look for it. Here are some helpful suggestions to shopping Amazon Prime Day and tips on how to save the most money this year.
Don't just shop at Amazon: This may be a weird one to hear, considering this is Amazon Prime Day we're talking about, but hear us out. Since Prime Day has gotten so dang popular over the years, many retailers out there are trying to get in on the action by running their own Prime Day-like sales alongside Amazon. If you've got a favorite store you like to shop at, don't be afraid to shop there as well. You'll be surprised what kind of discounts you can find.
Trust your gut on reviews: Here's the thing with Amazon's review system, it's not very good at filtering out useless and unhelpful feedback. If you head to almost any major product released in the past year, you'll see one star reviews with one sentence clearly expressing dissatisfaction and nothing else. You may even find "fake reviews" to help deter you from a good product or even steer you towards buying a bad product. If it's something you truly want and it's on sale, reviews may help but at the end of the day it's your money!
Compare prices: This applies to everything. Clothing, electronics, you name it. If it's on sale during Prime Day, chances are every seller who has it is dropping their prices. What you may not know, however, is that it may be cheaper in some cases to check out alternative sellers. Don't be afraid to click that "see other buying options" button from time to time.
Are Prime Day deals worth it?
The question of "Are Prime Day deals worth it?" gets asked quite a lot around this time, and quite frankly there's a yes and a no answer to this one. Depending on what exactly you're hoping to buy, Prime Day could be the perfect chance to get the best discount while it may be more beneficial to wait until Father's Day sales, Labor Day sales or even Black Friday / Cyber Monday sales.
That said, Prime Day deals are definitely worth if when it comes to electronics, smart tech and of course Prime services. Most Prime services, including Prime Video and Amazon Music Unlimited get some pretty sweet offers for newcomers and Prime members alike.
That mid-July date prediction is echoed by a report at Digital Commerce 360 which cites an announcement from Amazon to sellers who use the Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) service. The post is titled "Plan your shipment early for Prime Day 2022" and it says that sellers have until 29 April to submit their deals for Prime Day consideration. It also says: "Plan and send your shipment so that it arrives at fulfillment centers before June 20."
The Digital Commerce 360 report quotes Fahim Naim from ecommerce consulting agency Advantage Unified Commerce as saying: "Barring any major any setback, and based on the data and the timing of the information on Seller Central, all the stars are lining up for July 11 or 18." The same report says it is "extremely unlikely" Amazon Prime Day will be on the first Monday in July which is Independence Day in the US. Naim gives 11 July a 70% probability rating, and 18 July a 30% probability.
Are Amazon Prime Day deals real?
This is a question that gets asked a lot and not just on Amazon Prime Day, but Black Friday, too. And there are two answers – but both center on what you consider a 'deal' to be.
The first is that, yes, you do get products discounted on Amazon Prime Day, and sometimes they are discounted down to prices that they have never been at before. That in many people's eyes is a deal.
The thing is, though, as proved by numerous studies such as this 2022 report by Semrush, a lot of deals offered up during sales events such as Amazon Prime Day and Black Friday don't actually offer that good a discount.
The practice of artificially spiking prices on items in the weeks or months running up to a sales event, only so that they can then offer what looks like a large discount percentage, is rife within the industry, and what goes from being a jaw-dropping deal ends up, in reality, being just a small to modest price cut.
Of course, if you've wanted that product then you've still got it, and got it for marginally cheaper than it has been available for before, so in that sense, you could say you've still got a deal.
Another thing to factor into if a product is a 'deal' or not is where the product is in its lifecycle. If a 4K OLED TV is $400 off and it's been on the market for a year, then that's more just end-of-life price degradation in advance of its replacement coming out. Of course, the counterargument to that is that just because a product has been on the market for a while doesn't make it bad, or buying it at that point a bad deal.
Lastly, it is important to note the other elephant in the room – Black Friday. According to that Semrush report linked to above the biggest discounts of the year come during the Black Friday sales period, which coincides with the months of November and December.
As such, while Amazon Prime Day 2022 will be a great opportunity to buy discounted products, there's no guarantee those products won't be cheaper still during the Black Friday sales this year.
Will there be a second Prime Day in 2022?
While Prime Day has gone back to it's standard schedule of mid-summer savings, previous year's have seen the savings event get pushed back or even doubled-up to provide even more savings.
This year, chances are we won't see two Prime Days as Amazon has announced that it has gone back to it's July timeframe again. That doesn't mean Amazon won't be running more savings events throughout the year, as there's still Memorial Day, Labor Day and other big holidays to cover.
