With Amazon taking advantage of Covid and gouging its price on certain items, it’s time to see whether we can beat trillionaire Jeff Bezos at his tricks and dig out Amazon’s best and most hidden deals for 2020 and 2021.
Check out these ideas, tips, advice and hacks so you can save more when buying from a retail company that’s considered one of the biggest economic forces in the world. Here we list the best ways to get the biggest and best deals and discounts from Earth’s biggest store, Amazon. This guide is a mix of the best 3rd party tools, our guides and lots of the best deals found directly on Amazon. All links link directly to to the deal on Amazon unless otherwise stated. This guide will tell you how to get a discount on Amazon!
1. Cashbackbase: The least known way to get free stuff on Amazon
Cashbackbase (3rd party) is where you get Amazon products for 100% cashback. That’s right – totally free. Or significantly reduced. A $60 skateboard, for example, cost $9.99.
What’s the hook? Sellers either need to generate more sales, seek reviews for their startups or want to clean up their inventory.
Products change day-to-day, so at first glance the platform looks terrific. On the other hand, you need points for items. And these points require hours of reviews or other tasks, such as inviting people to Cashback, or writing or making a video on your Cashback experience.
2. AMZDiscover: Review and get stash
AMZDiscover (3rd party) is for Amazon sellers who want to find people to review their items. These sellers offer reviewers free products in return for their reviews.
To enroll as a reviewer, email AMZDiscover – support@amzdiscover.com – with a link to your Amazon profile page, an email address, and the categories you are interested in.
3. Amazon Vine for invitation-only reviewers
Amazon Vine is an Amazon-run program that invites certain reviewers on Amazon to review new and pre-release items. Reviewers are chosen based on how other Amazon customers graded your previous reviews. Reviews have to be helpful and quality-driven. If you’re chosen, you get free products.
Amazon Vine is an invitation-only program. Your best way to get in is to consistently write several helpful reviews and to develop a reputation for expertise in specific product categories.
4. Miscellaneous free stuff on Amazon
How about these, for starters:
- Free kindle ebooks either because their copyright has expired or because Amazon wants to promote certain authors. It’s worth checking this Amazon Best Sellers Top 100 Free list regularly.
- Free digital music and free software (go to either category, click Sort by: Low to High and the free rise to the top). Try a free trial here.
- A free 3-month trial of an Amazon Drive Unlimited cloud storage plan of your choice.
- Free audiobooks. Audible partners with Amazon. Cancel your trial with the site after a month and keep your two free Audible albums. This link will give you 2 free audio books when you trial Audible.
- Get $15 when you open an Amazon business account. Aiming to simplify workplace procurement and offering convenient delivery choices. Amazon business.
- Amazon FreeTime Unlimited Free Trial. 16000 kids friendly books, videos and apps, for Prime and non-Prime users. Only $2.99 a month after 30 day free trial ends.
5. Amazon’s Outlet Store and Warehouse Deals
Amazon’s Warehouse Outlet Store regularly slashes 30-60% on thousands of overstocked items from every category. Its Warehouse Deals adds significant discounts on gently-used, open box and refurbished items that include digital cameras or unlocked cell phones and TVs. Pivot to Today’s Deals in the top far left corner or subscribe to receive Deals of the Day in your inbox. Return shipping is free.
6. Price alerts
Online Price Alert (3rd party) monitors Amazon for price changes and emails you as soon as the price drops to your “target price”. Say you want a Sony ZV-1 digital camera – just click the price alert bookmarklet, and enter your default percentage for the product (for example 90% off the given price). When the price reaches $100, Amazon emails you.
The alert expires after a month, but you get an email from Amazon with a 30 days one-click extension.
7. Subscribe and save
Amazon’s “Subscribe & Save” helps you save up to 15% on at least five products for at least a month. Categories are household, baby care, pet supplies, grocery, health & wellness, and beauty/ personal care. You get free shipping and can cancel at any time.
Prime members unlock 20% savings on subscriptions.
8. Use Amazon Prime strategically
Amazon Prime gives you exclusive access to deals and discounts before anyone else with 30-minute early access to Prime Lightning Deals.
You get free Two-Day Shipping on thousands of items.
Gamers get free games and loot with Twitch Prime. Prime members read free from over a thousand books, magazines, comics, Kindle Singles, and more. Paid or free trial members in the US and Puerto Rico get unlimited streaming of movies and TV episodes. They’re just some of Prime’s benefits. Prime costs $12.99 (USA) a month but can save you money when you use it strategically, and is available in many countries.
Examples:
- Stagger its annual one month free trial around a “shop-buys” month like December or November to cut on price and save on shipping. You get free two-day shipping.
- Don’t need your Prime order right away? Select No-Rush Shipping and earn rewards for future purchases.
- Get access to Prime Early Access Deals, which are available to Prime members 30 minutes before regular shoppers.
- Look out for Prime Day, actually 2 days when more products are discounted and offers are available! Dates are announced.
Prime student and EBT card discounts
If you’re a student, you get six months free and up to 50% discount. Amazon Prime also offers discounts to people with a valid EBT card and Medicaid recipients (click here for discounted Prime).
Read our guide to work out if Amazon Prime is worth it for you.
9. Rebates
Amazon’s Rebate Center (3rd party) helps you search for rebates on Amazon products as long as you buy these before the purchase deadline. Process your rebates either with Paperless rebates or with mail-in rebates. In either case, you simply provide the transaction information from your Amazon.com packing slip along with other required details. It takes up to 15 weeks to process rebates. Track your rebate with this Tracking form.
10. CamelCamelCamel.com
CamelCamelCamel (3rd party) – Amazon free price tracker monitors millions of products and alerts you when prices drop, helping you decide when to buy. Scroll down to Amazon.com Discounts by Category for links to 12 categories. Once you’ve found the product you want to buy, put the product’s URL into the Camel search box for its price history and/or create a price watch.
11. Honey
Honey is a Chrome browser extension that you add to Chrome. There is also a Honey mobile app available. It is a price tracking and price history tool. It will compare all prices from all the Amazon sellers so you can find the cheapest. Currently Honey is available for all US Amazon customers as well as those in Canada where the Droplist feature is available too. Honey Droplist is their notification feature which will send you a message when the price drops below the one you have specified.
Amazon price history is available for 30,6,90 or 120 days and Honey will compare the exact same product, size and color as the one you want.
How to use Honey on Amazon. Simply add the extension to your version of the Chrome browser. Click on the Add to Chrome button on the Honey website, this will lead you to the Chrome Extension page, you will need to then click on the blue Add to Chrome button.
Honey for Amazon, as well as for other shops is totally free.
12. Bonus Ideas for Discounts & Deals
- Amazon’s Fast discount finder (3rd party) – A free Amazon tool that finds the best Amazon discounts on the fly!
- Amazon Underground – This includes “over $10,000 of apps and games that are actually free.”
- Kindle Daily Deal – You get one heavily discounted book on a daily basis. Sign up for the Kindle Daily Deals newsletter to get the latest deals.
- USAToday runs a section called These are the best deals on Amazon this weekend. (3rd party)
- Checkout Amazon’s own Today’s Deals page.
- Amazon Global free Super Saver Shipping can get you free delivery, read our guide to get free shipping at Amazon.
- Learn about this Amazon Super Saver delivery trick with our guide.
What do you think? Have you taken advantage of any of these freebies or tips for saving money on Amazon? – Do you know any better ways to get a deal or discount? Please share in the comments section below, we love to hear from you…….
This guide was edited on 10/06/21 to include more money saving ideas to help you to get even better discounts on Amazon. Included is the information about Honey a Chrome extension that helps you to search for the best prices by comparing Amazon sellers.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.