Amazon Prime Day 2020 in the US: is it going to be in August this year?

Amazon Prime Day 2020 is looming once again, and it’s the event that will get people looking to the big savings ahead of Black Friday 2020. However, due to the effect of the coronavirus pandemic, it looks like the Prime Day date could be moved this year.

When it does land, we’re expecting to see another raft of discounts for Amazon’s own-brand Echo speakers and smart displays, Fire Sticks for the TV and Fire tablets, and a widening of savings on its smart home wares – like the Ring camera.

Last year we saw some savings that weren’t even beaten on Black Friday later in the year, and even found a few bargains on Apple products like the Apple Watch, or Garmin fitness trackers too.

If you’re not aware, Prime Day is the time to get some big savings at the online retailer, with thousands of products discounted over the period – provided you’re signed up to Amazon Prime.

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Last year Prime members were snapping up products throughout the 48-hour event with over 175 million items sold.

That’s more than Amazon sold on Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined. That’s a massive increase from an already impressive 100 million products sold during the previous Prime Day sale, which was admittedly a shorter event at 36 hours – but it shows the sales period is becoming recognized as a key time to save money.

When is Amazon Prime Day 2020?

‘So, when is Prime Day 2020 going to be?’ is the currently-key question on the lips of every consumer looking to save money on Amazon’s own products this year – according to Reuters, Amazon Prime Day is now going to be in August at the earliest.

This moves it from its traditional July timeslot, and although the brand hasn’t confirmed the date for this year it’s never been pushed back beyond that month in a bid to improve sales during that time – and it’s previously worked well.

Depending on the impact of the virus, Amazon Prime Day 2020 will now be a little later in the year – which will have an impact on the savings offered, although how that will manifest is currently unclear.

It could see shoppers offered even wilder discounts to clear the stocks, or it could mean that third party sellers don’t have the same savings in place as we move closer to Black Friday.

How long will Prime Day 2020 last?

Well, it’s hard to say with any degree of certainty, and in light of the recent rumours of Prime Day 2020 moving back in the year it could be even longer than expected.

Prime Day a few years ago was only that, a day, but in 2018 it moved to 36 hours, and last year was a full two days.

We’re fully expecting Amazon to move to a Prime Week any year now, and with a rumoured $100 million worth of devices that will need to be shifted thanks to the delay, it could well be this year.

We can’t see Amazon reducing the amount of time Prime Day lasts for, so expect Prime Day 2020 to last at least 48 hours this year, if not longer.

What is Amazon Prime Day 2020?

Amazon Prime Day is a summer sales event on Amazon websites around the world where members of Amazon Prime get exclusive discounts on a wide range of items.

It’s not just Amazon-branded items either (although they’re among the most-bought every year), lots of other manufacturers and third-party merchants save their best deals for Prime Day too, knowing millions of extra shoppers will be hitting the online store.

Why does Amazon have Prime Day? It’s presented as a neat “thank you” to its paying members, but one that involves giving Amazon more money and shifting a lot of product at the same time.

You need to either sign up for a trial or be an existing member of Amazon Prime, paying for the privilege of free, swift delivery (although that’s currently being slowed down to make space for the essential items people are ordering, with the sign at the top of the site saying ‘Delivery times for some items may take longer than normal’) and is paid for monthly or yearly.

And it’s no coincidence the best deals are found on Amazon’s items. Buy a Kindle and you’re going to keep buying ebooks from Amazon.

Buy a Fire TV Stick you’re going to watch Prime Video (a great perk of membership) and maybe pay for the odd rental. Buy an Echo smart speaker and you’re into the Alexa family and helping Amazon fight off competition from rival Google’s Home devices.

What made Prime Day 2019 special?

Like we mentioned earlier, this year’s Prime Day sale was the largest shopping event in Amazon history. Prime members worldwide saved more than a billion dollars throughout the two-day sale.

It was also the longest sale in history, lasting a record 48hours – which was 12 hours more than the previous year. Never to outdo itself, Amazon surprised everyone and started large parts of the sale a day earlier on the Sunday, unofficially making it a 60-hour event.

Amazon celebrated this year’s sale event with a first-time concert exclusively for Prime members. The Amazon concert was headlined by a certain Taylor Swift and was available to stream on Prime Music or Prime Video, part of a promotion to not only get customers excited for the two-day sale but to also increase Prime membership signups.

Amazon reported that it welcomed more new Prime members on July 15 than any previous day, the 48-hour event marking the biggest days ever for member signups.

What were Prime Day’s best-selling Devices?

Millions of Alexa-enabled devices were purchased during Prime Day 2019, marking it the biggest event ever for Amazon devices.

The top-selling device deals worldwide were the Echo Dot, Fire TV Stick, and 4K Fire TV stick. It was also a big day for Fire Tablets, and Alexa devices with screens were also popular this year, with products like the Echo Show and Echo Show 5.

The Ring and Blink devices were showed strongly this year with double the amount purchased compared to last year and with first-time discounts on the Blink XT2 home security kit.

Customers also purchased hundreds of thousands of Amazon kids’ devices this Prime Day, such as Echo Dot Kids Edition, Fire 7 Kids Edition tablet, and Fire HD 8 Kids Edition tablet.

What products sold the most on Prime Day?

Amazon devices weren’t the only popular items during the Prime Day event. The retail giant reported that Prime members bought more than 100,000 lunchboxes, 100,000 laptops, 200,000 TVs, 300,000 headphones, 350,000 luxury beauty products, 400,000 pet products, 650,000 household cleaning supplies, and more than 1 million toys.

A surprisingly popular item last year, Prime members purchased more than 200,000 LifeStraw Personal Water Filters at this year’s sale event, making it a top-seller in the US for the 2nd year in a row.

Other Prime Day best-sellers included the Instant Pot DUO60, the 23andMe Health + Ancestry kit, and Crest 3D White Professional Effects Whitestrips Kits.

Around the world on Prime Day, best-sellers included the Nintendo Switch, iRobot Roomba, Sony PlayStation Classic Console, and the JBL Bluetooth Speaker to name a few.

Some interesting non-tech best-sellers included a Dove exfoliating scrub, Coca-Cola Zero soft drink, Finish Powerbowl dishwater tablets, and Ariel laundry detergent.

The best Amazon Prime Day deals of 2019

Before we look forward to Amazon Prime Day 2020, we’ve listed the best deals from this year’s sale below. While nearly all the items are no longer on sale for the prices we saw during the July sales period, you can see what sort of bargains to expect in 2020.

You can also get a sense of what deals will be around for Black Friday. While Amazon’s own devices are usually saved for Prime Day, you’ll still see all-time-low prices on several other items throughout the site.

What did Amazon’s rivals do on Prime Day?

Prime Day wasn’t just a success for Amazon – other online retailers joined in on the shopping holiday with their own mid-summer sale. According to Retail Dive, large retailers (those with one billion dollars or more in annual revenue) rose 64% compared to an average Monday, which is up from last year’s 54%.

This year Walmart tried to compete with the tech giant, promoting their own summer sale that lasted all week rather than just 48-hours. Named ‘The Big Save Sale,’ Walmart discounted several popular items throughout their site and price matched many of Amazon’s top deals. Walmart also discounted Google Home devices, which aren’t available on Amazon’s website. Walmart’s sale also had a slight advantage over Prime Day because unlike Amazon, the deals were available to everyone with no membership required.

Other retailers that joined in on the sale event included Macy’s, Best Buy, Target, and Home Depot. eBay even promoted a competing “Crash Sale” that would take place if Amazon’s site crashed as it did during Prime Day 2018. While Amazon’s website didn’t crash, it did experience technical difficulties which led to eBay unlocking new deals.

Did anything go wrong on Prime Day 2019?

While Amazon’s site didn’t crash during Prime Day 2019, it did experience some technical issues. For the 2nd year in a row Prime members had problems checking out during the early hours of Amazon’s sale.

Several customers complained that they received an “Add to Cart Failed” message when trying to check out. This occurred when Amazon Prime Day officially launched on Monday, and the issues seemed to be fixed later on that day.

When Prime Day launched 12 hours before the official start time, the TechRadar team also had problems with Amazon’s own device deals.The sale price was listed on the item, but once you added the device to your cart, the discounted price would disappear.

This issue seemed to work itself out, but it’s still an annoyance that Amazon was still experiencing issues when last year’s crash made headlines around the world.