The best deals for your last minute holiday gift shopping

Buying a capable streaming player for your TV is easier and cheaper in 2020 than it’s ever been. So long as you’re willing to spend at least $50, you can buy something that’ll deliver 4K resolution and HDR color from apps like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Disney+. With universal search that spans all of the big services, streaming players make it easy to find something to watch when you finally make it to the couch after a long day.

If you’ve got a fairly new 4K TV at home, you might not see the need for a set-top box or streaming stick; it’s probably already got many of your essential apps preloaded and ready to go. If you’re satisfied with what’s there, no one’s forcing you to buy an extra gadget. But app selection can differ between TV brands, so if you want everything under the sun, a streaming player is a great way to fill in those gaps. Another advantage is speed: if you find the apps on your TV sluggish to use, a speedy Roku or Fire TV might help alleviate that frustration. And sometimes companies will end development of an app for older TVs, but you can bet that updates will continue long into the future for the streaming box equivalent.

We’ve reached the final few days before the holidays, and before you know it, going to a local retailer — and dealing with mobs of people — will be your last resort for buying gifts on time. To avoid having that happen, we’d suggest buying items online as soon as you can.

Thankfully, several retailers are making those shopping duties cheap and easy by offering free and fast shipping. It wouldn’t be the holidays without a little stress, but you can avoid at least some of it by finishing up your shopping before the window for on-time delivery comes to a close.

True wireless earbuds are getting most of the spotlight these days, but there are always cases where tried-and-true over-ear wireless headphones are going to win out. Noise cancellation is one such advantage; though the technology is increasingly making its way into more wireless earbuds, there’s no beating full-size headphones if you want to truly hush your surroundings and enjoy your music without any distractions. Wrap them around your head, and you can escape any nearby ruckus like the constant hum of an airplane cabin or the buzz of a coffee shop.

Unfortunately, buying a great pair of headphones — especially with noise cancellation, which you’ll want in your everyday, take-everywhere pair — means spending a lot of money, with most good options ranging between $300 and $400. But can you really put a price on peace and quiet or making long-haul flights more bearable? I regularly use them to fall asleep a little easier — with nothing playing at all.

Target is picking up where Walmart, Verizon, B&H Photo and Google left off, continuing the aggressive deal that might be all many people need to outfit their house or apartment with Google Assistant this holiday season. When you buy a Home Hub smart display, two Home Mini smart speakers will be included for free, at a total price of $100. The Hub ordinarily retails for $149, with the speakers going for $49 each. This deal will end once Sunday, December 23rd expires.

Obviously both products have been discounted at times during the holiday season — including right now at various retailers. But this bundle from the Google Store B&H Photo Verizon Walmart Target seems pretty tough to beat.

The holidays are just days away, and if you haven’t mapped out your plan of attack for gift-getting, it might be too late to ship everything on your family or friend’s wishlist — at least without paying dearly for shipping costs. However, don’t forget about digital gifts. While some might miss having a box to open on the holidays, the big upsides to opting for digital gifts is that they’re easy to buy, sometimes more affordable to acquire than physical versions, and best of all, they arrive instantly.

Here are a few ideas (okay, there’s actually a lot of ideas) for digital gifts to round out your bounty this holiday season.

The annual winter sale has begun today on Steam, and as usual, you’ll be able to find most of this year’s most popular PC games for less than their usual cost. This sale will be going until January 3rd, 2019.

Valve has the tendency to change deals as its sales go on, and we hope that holds true this year because the offering so far isn’t that great, nor is it varied. Here are the best PC game deals as of the time of writing:

If you’re looking to add a game console to your entertainment center over the holidays (or in the case of the Switch, carry it around everywhere you go), Nintendo and Microsoft are making that a bit cheaper — or at least adding more value to your purchase. As usual, Sony isn’t partaking in any pre-holiday deals, though you can pre-order a new PS4 Pro bundle set to release on January 29th, 2019 that has a special Kingdom Hearts III-inspired design, and includes Kingdom Hearts III for free. A free game is a deal, even if it won’t come until 2019.

Starting with Nintendo, finding a Switch is far easier in 2018 than it was last year. Several retailers, including Target, Best Buy, Amazon, and GameStop, are offering a $25 gift cards with purchase. $25 isn’t enough to pay for any of the Switch’s best titles, though it can knock nearly half the cost off, say, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, or Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. In the absence of a price drop for the Switch (it’s still a very strong seller,) getting a freebie like this tossed in is about as good as it gets for now.

If $149 for the Fitbit Versa wasn’t a good enough discount for you during Black Friday, Macy’s is offering the best deal that we’ve seen yet. Normally $199, you’ll be able to snag one for $89.99 either until December 24th or until it sells out. Amazon is also getting in on the deal, though as it stands, you definitely won’t get it before Christmas.

Compared to the more expensive, older Fitbit Ionic, the Versa lacks built-in GPS, though it makes up for it in some ways with a design that’s easier on the eyes. This deal is for the models with a peach, gray, or black-colored wrist strap, though it’s pretty affordable to buy a different set and swap them out yourself.

Retailers have been vying to offer the lowest prices on iPads, but Walmart and Amazon are each hosting arguably the best iPad deal yet. The 32GB model is now going for $229 — a clean $100 off of its original price. If you’re looking for the 128GB model, Amazon and Target have you covered for $349, which is $80 off the usual price.

For the past week, the iPad’s price point has matched, or has come close to matching, Black Friday prices. Now, it’s cheaper than ever. With the winter holidays just days away, today is probably your last chance to get it on time, and to buy it at this price. Walmart is offering two-day shipping for the iPad, so that puts delivery before Christmas, though Amazon’s page says that it will ship after Christmas.

More often than not, gaming laptops aren’t a great value. But sometimes there are exceptions near the holidays, and HP’s 15-inch Pavilion gaming laptop is one of them. It’s on sale for $599.99 on eBay, which is hundreds off of its original price. Inside of this machine is just about enough to power through the latest PC games on low to medium graphical settings at playable frame rates. Though if you enjoy playing, say, Fortnite, this will run it smoothly on higher settings.

Looking at the specs, what stands out here is its Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti which, while not necessarily a workhorse for gaming, is the de facto GPU in gaming laptops that usually costs hundreds more. In addition to the decent graphics card, this laptop features a 15.6-inch matte IPS display that pushes a 1080p resolution, an 8th Gen Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage via a 7,200RPM spinning drive. While all of that is pretty much par for the course, HP’s Pavilion budget gaming laptop has a few unexpected niceties, like a USB-C port, backlit keyboard, and a complimentary game bundle that lets you pick five free games, including Cuphead and Total War: Warhammer II, among others.

TCL’s 6-Series 4K HDR televisions with Roku software built in are an incredible value even at their usual asking price. You can spend thousands on a big 4K TV, but if your eyes are set on something cheaper, The Verge calls TCL’s latest “the best 4K TV under $1,000.” And today, you’ll be able to find it for far less than that at Best Buy.

Normally $599.99, you’ll be able to check out with a $100 discount on the 55-inch model, which brings the final price down to $499.99. Black Friday and Cyber Monday offered better deals on 4K HDR TVs in this size range, but TCL’s offering is most likely a step above in terms of build quality and performance.

The Microsoft Surface Pro 6 is a versatile and capable Windows 10 computer, and the upgraded version donned in a matte black finish is on sale at B&H Photo following its expiration at Best Buy. Normally $1,199 for the 256GB version in black (sans Type Cover keyboard), this deal loops the computer in along with a matching Type Cover for $999. That’s about $300 off of the usual price if you were to purchase these two items together.

Comparing this midtier machine to the low-end model that usually sells for $899 (though you can find it for $799 right now), the differences are rather slight. At its base configuration, the Surface Pro 6 includes a modest 8GB of RAM, 128GB of storage, and a quad-core Intel Core i5. Though, as Apple did with its polycarbonate MacBook back in the day, Microsoft charges a premium if you want the Surface Pro 6 in black, and it comes with 256GB of storage by default.

Amazon’s free holiday shipping promotion, which removes the minimum $25 purchase requirement for non-Prime members, has been extended until December 18th. Orders placed by then are guaranteed to arrive in time for Christmas. Amazon says it has also expanded free one-day shipping and free same-day delivery for Prime members to more than 10,000 cities this year, so last-minute gift buyers can shop for holiday items until December 24th.

In the 30 or so cities with Prime Now, you’ll be able to order something as late as 9:15PM local time on Christmas Eve.

In case you missed the few opportunities around Black Friday to find the Apple HomePod for $249 — $100 off of its usual price — here’s another one. B&H Photo, Target and Best Buy are each offering a limited supply of the HomePod in both its black or white color options for $249. For perspective, $249 for a new HomePod is still $50 cheaper than Apple offers for refurbished models.

There are a lot of smart speakers on the market from the likes of Google and Amazon, but Apple’s debut to the space is unique in a few ways. It’s tailor-made for those who are all in on Apple products and services (though, not super friendly to those outside of that walled garden.) It’s small, yet it can fill most rooms with clear, detailed audio, and it’s compatible with AirPlay 2.

Amazon’s new Kindle Paperwhite is its best e-reader yet, with its IPX8 water resistance being reason enough for some to take the plunge. This model also supports Bluetooth, so you can connect headphones and listen to audiobooks via Audible. Despite releasing just a few months ago, we’re now seeing a few deals that make this worth considering over any other Kindle available, whether you planned on upgrading or not.

A few things to note before you check out the deals. These prices will last until December 20th, and the discounts only apply for Kindle options with special offers, meaning that Amazon will place ads on the lockscreen, though you can opt out for an additional $20 at the time of purchase, or after through the Kindle’s device settings.

Google is offering yet another discount on the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL, its latest flagship smartphones known for their impressive cameras — particularly in the dark. As is the trend with most deals that are popping up around now, this offer from Google isn’t quite as good as what we saw over the Black Friday and Cyber Monday weekend. Still, this is probably as good as it’s going to get for an unlocked Pixel 3 this holiday.

Until December 22nd, you can get $100 off of the Pixel 3 at the Google Store, bringing the price down to a friendlier $699 for the 64GB model, and $799 for the 128GB option. If you’re looking for reasons to pick the 3 over the 3 XL, it all comes down to size. Its 5.5-inch display makes it easier to hold than the 3 XL, which has a 6.3-inch screen.

Amazon’s range of tech, including Fire TV streaming devices, Echo smart speakers and displays, Fire tablets, and more, were heavily discounted during the Black Friday and Cyber Monday period in late November, and the company is offering another chance to save before more holidays arrive.

Most of these deals are within $10 of being as good as we saw a few weeks ago, though the reader-favorite Ring Video Doorbell 2 with a free Echo Dot is coming back at its best-ever $169.99 price point.

The new iPad Pro might be the best fit for those who want its slick, new design, and to take solace in owning the most powerful tablet that Apple has created yet. For everyone else, last year’s iPad Pro is still plenty capable, and now it’s considerably more affordable thanks to a sale at B&H Photo. This discount focuses on the 12.9-inch model in particular, and to give you a taste of what’s below, even the 512GB version with Wi-Fi and LTE support costs the same as the new 12.9-inch iPad Pro with 64GB sans cellular support.

If it’s time to upgrade your gaming PC, there’s no better time of the year than Cyber Monday. (Yes, we just said that about Black Friday, but it’s basically the same thing.) It’s the shopping season when manufacturers throw out deep discounts on laptops, desktops, components, and peripherals; and when stores like Amazon, Best Buy and Newegg sometimes compete to make those discounts even deeper.

Every year’s different — neither Black Friday or Cyber Monday hosted amazing deals on processors or PC memory — but this year, the solid state drive (SSD) sales are pretty phenomenal. If you’re still running Windows off a traditional spinning magnetic hard drive, well... just trust us, it’ll make your entire PC feel like new.

The end of the year is fast approaching, bringing with it the yearly anxiety of what the lyrics to “Auld Lang Syne” are, and what gifts you should be getting for the wonderful people in your life. Whether that’s for friends, family, co-workers, pets, they, them, him, her, secret Santa, or white elephant, it can sometimes be difficult to figure out what to get people.

So to make your lives a little easier in 2018, we’ve tapped into the collective knowledge of The Verge to put together a list of great gifts for all manner of ages, sizes, and budgets. Or at least you might get a good present idea for a loved one from our recommendations.