LOS ANGELES -- The "deals" for Amazon Prime Day are everything we expected. Great, generous discounts on Amazon's own products, close-outs on Amazon and other brands' products that didn't do well, and so-so deals on a lot else. The surprise: It wasn't possible to see some of these purported deals early on. We didn't foresee Amazon not being able to handle the traffic to shop, and having much of the website down for over three hours Monday. More:On Amazon Prime Day, site and app crash; shoppers left in lurch instead see photos of dogs More:Which Kindle should I buy? Pros and cons of Amazon's ebook readers More:Amazon Echo vs. Dot? Show vs. Spot? Which smart speaker should you buy? More:Tempted to buy an Amazon tablet or Fire TV? Read this first Amazon kicked off its highly touted fourth annual Prime Day with two weeks of breathless hype. We got a good sense early that Amazon would heavily discount its own fare, as it began offering the house deals as early as last week, despite the sale not starting officially until 3 p.m. ET on Monday. If you ever wanted an Amazon-made product, the prices offered were reminiscent of holiday shopping time. The entry level Echo Dot speaker, normally $49.99, dropped back down to the holiday pricing of $29.99 for a day and a half--the Prime sale ends Tuesday. Dot brings consumers into the world of Alexa, Amazon's popular digital assistant, and rival to Google Assistant and Apple's Siri. The larger Echo speaker, normally $99.99, is on sale for $69.99. The Cloud Cam security camera, normally $120, on sale for $60. The best deals seemed to be also focused on closeouts. The Echo Show, which brought video to Alexa, and hasn't sold as well as other models, saw $100 knocked off the price, to $120. The Ring2 video doorbell, which is now in the Amazon family, looked to be a great deal at $174, down from $249. Except that this model needs to be installed by an electrician, while the original, at $99 and not discounted even by 50 cents, uses a rechargeable battery and can be installed by non-pros. After that, it's a lot of $5 off here, $10 off there. Many so-called "deals" just weren't. Optimum Gold Standard Whey is priced at $29.99 as a special deal; yet the GNC website has the product at the exact same price. (The product has since been updated to $28.03) An Amazon Basics $23.49 tripod had the same price Monday as it did on Sunday. Many products on the site weren't discounted at all. An 8-pack of Panasonic Enloop AA rechargeable batteries were offered for $18.78, with no discount, compared to an Amazon house brand AA rechargeable 8-count battery at $14.99, again, with no discount. Paper towels were no bargain. Amazon's Presto house brand of 12 count paper towels is offered for $16.98; a similar Target house brand is available for $12.29. Alexa-only offers didn't come through as of press time Monday afternoon, due to website issues. The command was to ask Alexa for today's Daily Deals. The voice-activated assistants response: "I've been busy today. All my deals are sold out. Check back later." The app, when we checked it again at 3 p.m. PT, said that the sale would begin at 3 p.m. ET, and to start shopping then. Oh well. A sale that promises $15 off a chair, $2.50 off a personal carrying case and a "Lightning deal" of $5 off a bottle of castor oil? Sorry Jeff Bezos. Saving money on Alexa is a real deal. Castor oil? I don't think so. Follow USA TODAY's Jefferson Graham (@jeffersongraham) on Twitter, Instagram and YouTube, subscribe to the Talking Tech newsletter (http://technewsletter.usatoday.com) and listen to the daily Talking Tech podcast on Stitcher, Google & Apple Podcasts.<doc-sep>Amazon’s annual Prime Day is here a little earlier than promised. The tech giant kicked off several Echo and Kindle sales yesterday morning, hours before the supposed start time of 12PM PT (3PM ET). As always, the sale is exclusive to those who have an Amazon Prime membership. Prime Day is a chance to grab products as varied as DNA kits and Instant Pots at significant discounts, but the more well-known draw of Prime Day is discounted Alexa-powered devices and Kindle e-readers. Certain items like the Fire TV, the Fire TV Stick, and the Echo Look haven’t been 50 percent off before. For those who are looking to buy several Alexa-powered devices and pair them throughout your home for more coverage, there are also several bundles and deals for buying multiples of the same device. And if you have an Amazon Prime Rewards Visa card, the usual 5 percent cash back is raised to 10 percent for select Amazon devices. We’ve picked out the best deals here: We’re rounding up all of the best Amazon Prime Day deals in a running list here. Check back as the day progresses! Last updated July 17th, 5:16PM ET.<doc-sep>
Only the best deals on Verge-approved gadgets get the Verge Deals stamp of approval, so if you're looking for a deal on your next gadget or gift from major retailers like Amazon, Walmart, Best Buy, Target, and more, this is the place to be. Happy Prime Day 2018! Looking for the best deals? You’ve come to the right place because Prime Day kicks off right now, July 16th at 3PM ET / 12PM PT, and it will offer a veritable landslide of deals for a full 36 hours until 2:59AM ET (July 18th) / 11:59PM PT (July 17th) on Amazon’s website. Amazon does appear to be having some issues with the Prime Day launch: parts of the website down for users around the world. So if you’re not seeing any deals yet, try to be a little patient. Just like in years past, Amazon will offer two types of deals on Prime Day: regular price cuts, which will become available at various points throughout the 36 hours of the “holiday” but otherwise work as regular Amazon purchases, and Lightning Deals, which will appear for specific times and for specific quantities only. So you’ll want to keep an eye on that deal page if you’re looking for anything specific. You can also join us here at The Verge. We’ll be sorting, collecting, and highlighting all the best deals for you right on this page, so check back often. Related The Amazon Fire TV and Echo Look are 50 percent cheaper for Prime Day It’s Amazon Prime day, so there’s a mountain of deals on Amazon’s own Echo, Fire TV, and Kindle hardware — so many, in fact, that we’ve rounded those up in a separate post here. As always, you’ll need to be an Amazon Prime customer to take advantage of Prime Day deals. If you don’t have an account, you can sign up for a free trial here, although you’ll want to remember to cancel it within 30 days if you don’t want to get charged. Check out the list below for the best Prime Day 2018 deals out there so far: Entertainment Computing Mobile Accessories Gaming Home Misc. Update July 16th, 3:33PM: Added details of Amazon outage. Last updated July 17th, 11:40PM ET.