Prepare for Prime Day with our price predictions for Echo, other Amazon devices

The better prepared you are when Amazon Prime Day 2019 kicks off on July 15, the more likely you’ll be able to find and take advantage of the best Prime Day deals. With literally millions of products marked down for the 48-hour Prime Day event, plus the hundreds of other retailers that are hosting aggressive sales during the same period, lack of preparation could be costly.

We don’t have insider pricing knowledge for Prime Day 2019, nor do we use a Magic 8 ball to predict likely sale prices of popular products. We have, however, been busy tracking prices of what will surely be some of the most popular products during Prime Day. We’ve paid particular attention to Amazon’s own branded smart home devices and products because the retail giant has a history of offering deep price cuts on Echo, Fire TV, Ring, and Kindle devices in particular.

We also looked back in time to check Amazon device price levels, but only for 12 months. Digital products and devices are frequently updated and refreshed with new features and better performance, so looking back more than a year for price comparisons wouldn’t necessarily be enlightening. We did, however, check our archives to find the prices of many of Amazon’s most popular products then and now during Prime Day 2018 and Black Friday 2018.

Amazon device prices then and now

The following table represents what we’re sure will be some of Amazon’s hottest-selling products during Prime Day 2019. The product names in the left column are live links so that you can check current pricing yourself. The prices in the middle column represent the lowest single product prices we found for last year’s big sales events. These prices don’t include the extra savings you’ll find when Amazon bundles multiple units of the same device or products that work together.

Price predictions for Amazon brand smart home devices

We believe you will find the best deals on Amazon’s gateway smart home products and on device bundles. During the past year, Amazon frequently bundled a free Echo Dot with other smart home products for no additional charge. The Dot is Amazon’s lowest-cost smart speaker and can control a raft of other devices and device families. Want to buy a smart alarm system, outdoor security lighting, or a video doorbell? You can use an Echo Dot to control, manage, and check the status of any of those systems. When Amazon adds a free Echo Dot to sweeten a deal, you win.

We suspect Amazon will cut the Echo Dot’s single-unit price below $30. Amazon sold out of Dots priced at $24 during Black Friday, so the company may decide to hold the line at $30, but we don’t think that will happen.

Also, since smart home platforms benefit when users have many devices in their homes, look for deals with multiple devices. We’ll be surprised but not shocked if we see a $100 deal for five Echo Dots. Amazon runs sales for multiple Echo Shows and Fire HD 8 Tablets most of the time, so we expect to see those as well. Multiple-unit bundling doesn’t make as much sense for smart alarms, security lights, or Fire TV products, but tablets, smart speakers, and smart displays are prime candidates for those kind of deals.

Amazon doesn’t give advance notice about new versions of existing products or brand-new products, but in recent years, it has introduced new devices in August and September. If there are new products in the pipeline, and if Amazon has a deep inventory of earlier products that will be replaced, we may see some surprisingly low prices on select devices for Prime Day.

If you’re planning to make major purchases during this year’s Prime Day event from Amazon or other merchants, do your research in advance. When you know exactly which product or products will meet your needs and the right price points for your budget, that’s the best preparation you can make.