18 Great Deals From Best Buy’s Early Black Friday Sale (2022)
Get cameras, headphones, and smart home gadgets before Halloween even arrives….
While it’s way too early to be talking about Black Friday, it is at least objectively cooler to associate the phrase with Halloween than Thanksgiving. So we’ll forgive Best Buy for kicking off its sale a month early. Fortunately, it also means you’ve got extra time to score deals on a ton of electronics from the retailer this week.
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Camera Deals
The Hero11 from GoPro (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is one of our favorite action cameras. This model adds a taller sensor that’s great for vertical video, if you’re into that sort of thing, and can record up to 5.3-K video—though you’ll need a new-ish phone for the latter.
Sony’s A7 cameras are consistently among our top picks for most people and while the A7 IV (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is our favorite, it’s also really expensive. If you don’t mind missing out on some newer autofocus features, however, the A7 III is also a great pick, and it’s on sale right now.
Another step down from the A7 III (though still a great camera in its own right), this AII kit comes with a 28- to 70-mm variable lens. If this is your first mirrorless and you don’t already have Sony lenses, this is a great place to get started without unloading a ton of cash.
Ecosystem lock-in is real in the camera world, and if you’re a die-hard Canon fan, the EOS-R is our top pick for you. It’s a hefty camera with satisfying machined metal bits, phase-detect autofocus, and even a handy cover that pops out to protect your sensor when you change lenses.
Audio Deals
These Beats headphones (8/10, WIRED Recommends) are particularly great if you’re in the Apple ecosystem. They pair easily with iPhones and other Apple devices and get incredible Bluetooth range and at least 20 hours of battery. Unfortunately, Android users might not enjoy the same battery life.
Our resident audiophile, Parker Hall, called the Galaxy Buds2 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) “the new standard in midrange wireless earbuds.” They’re comfortable, with active noise canceling and enough water resistance to survive your workouts.
If your workouts are more intense than those of the average person, you might prefer headphones designed to keep up with you. On that front, the Jabra Elite 7 Active is our favorite. In our testing, they fit people with wildly different ear sizes without falling out. They also have great noise canceling and at least eight hours of battery life.
Google may be a relative latecomer to the world of earbuds, but the Pixel Buds Pro (9/10, WIRED Recommends) impressed us with seven hours of playtime, intuitive touch controls, and the ability to easily swap between devices. Unfortunately, they’re missing some features if you use them with iPhones.
While we haven’t tested this specific model, Sony’s WH-1000XM4 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is still our top overall pick for wireless headphones. This model is normally slightly cheaper than other options, but today it’s downright affordable while featuring many of the benefits of Sony’s headphone design and expertise.
This M-Series soundbar from Vizio (9/10, WIRED Recommends) strikes the perfect balance of detailed surround sound audio—without breaking the budget. We particularly like this one for gaming, as it makes it easy to hear that enemy sneaking around behind you.
Wearable Deals
Despite Google getting back into the smart watch game lately, Samsung is still making the best smart watch for Android users right now. The Galaxy Watch5 (7/10, WIRED Recommends) has a lot of fitness features that are comparable to those on the Apple Watch, though some—like electrocardiogram measurements—only work if you pair the Watch5 with a Samsung phone.
It’s no surprise that the best smart watch for iPhones is the Apple Watch. While the Series 7 (8/10, WIRED Recommends) isn’t the newest model on the block, this discount makes it an attractive, affordable option.
Smart Home Deals
Google’s Nest Hub Max (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is our favorite smart display overall. It has great speakers, a spacious 10-inch touchscreen, and a camera for video calls. Google’s software can also identify specific members of the house to show only the reminders and events that are relevant for that person, and it even has a guest mode so other people can use it without seeing your personalized results.
If you prefer your smart display without a camera (and there are plenty of reasons you might), the smaller 7-inch Nest Hub does most of what the Max can, in a cheaper package. It supports gesture control so you can pause videos with a hand movement, making it great in the kitchen.
There’s no cheaper way to get into the Google smart home ecosystem than with the Nest Mini. At $20 each, you could put one of these in most rooms of your house. They don’t have the robust speakers of more expensive options, but if all you need is to set timers and get reminders, this is an excellent entry.
In the Amazon ecosystem, the Dot serves the same bare-bones entry purpose. It offers a basic set of voice commands for playing music, organizing your calendar, and setting timers. While $20 isn’t the cheapest we ever see it, it’s pretty close.
The fourth-generation Echo (8/10, WIRED Recommends) provides a nice upgrade over the basics. It comes with room-filling sound, a 3.5-mm output to connect to a bigger sound system, and the usual host of Alexa commands.
Lenovo makes some pretty great smart home accessories for the Google Assistant ecosystem (sometimes even nicer than those from Google itself.) This alarm clock is a great example. It offers a 4-inch smart display and alarm clock features to help you wake up, and it comes with a spot to wirelessly charge your phone at night.
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