Amazon US Prime Day deals: tablets and smartwatches

2024-07-17

Amazon Prime Day continues – we focused on smartphones yesterday, today we will look at tablet and smartwatch deals. Naturally, you need an active Prime subscription to get these prices.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE+ is a great mid-range tablet for fans of IPS LCD – this one has a 12.4” 90Hz panel. The Exynos 1380 is fast enough for casual gaming (but don’t expect AAA titles to work on high settings) and you get DeX multitasking (but no video out).

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 is $200 more and features a smaller 11” display, but a 120Hz OLED this time. This one has the more powerful Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 and can do wired and wireless video out with DeX.

If you want the larger 12.4” display, but with flagship specs, the Galaxy Tab S9+ is another $200 jump up.

For a cheap tablet, the Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+ is down to just under $150, but we’d pay the $190 for the 8/128GB version – it has double the storage and (more importantly) double the RAM. It has an 11” 90Hz LCD and a Snapdragon 695 chipset.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite (2024) is discounted to almost Tab A9+ levels. This third edition of the slate has a 10.4” LCD (60Hz, 2,000 x 1,200px) and a 7,040mAh battery (15W charging). DeX is supported, but video out is not, so this is only for on-tablet multitasking. Note that storage is expandable.

The Google Pixel Tablet is pricier, but comes with the speaker dock. This is an interesting combo that turns the tablet into a smart display. The slate has a 10.95” IPS LCD (60Hz, 2,560 x 1,600px) and a Tensor G2 chipset, plus a 7,020mAh battery that is kept topped up by the speaker dock via a magnetic system with pogo pins (so no wires, but no wireless charging either).

Amazon has deep discounts on its own products, of course. The Amazon Fire Max 11 is a great slate for media consumption with its 11” IPS LCD (60Hz, 2,000 x 1,200px) and stereo speakers. Note that the version with 64GB storage has lockscreen ads, the 128GB one (which is only $20 more) removes the ads.

The Amazon Fire HD 10 is a 10.1” tablet under $100. It’s not powerful by any means, but it now comes with 3GB of RAM as standard (earlier iterations had only 2GB). This is a 1,920 x 1,200px (16:10) display, so it’s great for streaming too.

The Amazon Fire HD 8 is available in vanilla and Plus forms with $15 separating them. Both have 8” 1,280 x 800px displays and 6-core CPUs. The Plus model has more RAM (3GB vs. 2GB) and a faster charger in the box (100% in 3 hours instead of 5 hours). Alternatively, the Plus can be charged with a wireless dock, so this can be used as a smart display too.

If you’re thinking of getting a cheap-o tablet for the little one, check out the Amazon Fire HD 8 Kids Pro. This one comes with a case to protect it from careless hands and (even better) has a 2-year worry-free warranty. The tablet also comes with a free year of Amazon Kids+ – this is a sort of streaming service with ad-free books, games, videos and apps. The Kids+ subscription is normally $6 a month.

The Apple iPhones are not part of Prime Day, but the Watches are. The Apple Watch Series 9 can be picked up for $280 for the 41mm version, the 45mm one is $30 more. This watch has ECG and is water resistant up to 50m.

The Apple Watch SE (2022) is a cheaper alternative – $100 less, even for the 44mm model – but it misses out on the ECG and things like Always On Display mode.

Samsung’s Galaxy Watch7 and Watch Ultra aren’t even out yet, so they are not part of the promotion. The 2023 models are, however. The Samsung Galaxy Watch6 also has ECG and is rated for 50m water resistance. Right now, it’s cheaper than even the SE watch from Apple. Note that the ECG function requires a Samsung phone to work.

Then there’s the Samsung Galaxy Watch6 Classic. This remains the latest model with a rotating bezel – the Watch7 lacks a Classic version, the Ultra doesn’t have a rotating bezel either.

Finally, this isn’t a smartwatch but a smart ring instead. The Oura Smart Ring 3rd gen has been around for quite a while, which has tempered its price. It tracks sleep, stress, heart rate and more. Note that the Oura Membership is $6 a month. Also, the “plain” versions are cheaper than the silver and gold versions, but note that those don’t actually use precious metals.

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