Are Amazon Prime Day deals any good?

It's the Amazon Prime Day sale again next week, but are the deals actually any good? 

The sale offers exclusive discounts for Amazon Prime members on hundreds of thousands of products. This time 'Prime Big Deal Days', as it's now called, is on Tuesday 6 October and Wednesday 7 October. 

But are the deals any good, and is it worth holding out to get the best prices? We analysed the pricing history of some of the most high-profile deals to find out. 

Should you wait for Amazon Prime Day?

Our exclusive research uncovers the real story behind the prices of some of the most high-profile Amazon Prime Day deals to help you decide whether to shop in the sale this time.  

We looked into 32 deals on popular products on the Amazon UK website during the last Amazon Prime Day sale in June, analysing the prices of products in the six months leading up to the sale. 

The good news for deal hunters is almost two thirds of the deals had not been beaten in price in the previous six months – they had either not been as cheap as their Amazon Prime sale price previously or, if they had, they hadn't been cheaper. 

But that's not the whole story – a third of deals had actually been offered at a lower price than their advertised Amazon Prime sale price during the six months prior.

These included: 

• An Amazon Kindle (newest generation) which was £79.99 in the Prime sale but was cheaper less than three months before that, when it was on sale at £74.99 for nine days at the beginning of April
• An Amazon Fire HD10 Kids Pro Tablet (newest gen) was £129.99 in the Prime sale but you could have found it cheaper on 22 days in the six months prior, including at £119.99 for two days in March and £114.99 for almost three weeks in late December and early January
• Beats Studio Pro – Wireless Bluetooth Noise Cancelling Headphones were £159 in the Prime sale but cheaper on 14 other days in the six months leading up to it, including being £129 at the end of December and £149 in January
• A BlackMeta Quest 3S Virtual Reality Headset which was £271.99 in the Prime sale but cheaper on 28 other days in the six months prior, including spells at £264 in February and April and £229 for a couple of days in December

How much are the savings?

We also looked at the claimed reference prices stated on these deals to see how relevant or genuine they appeared to be.

Many Amazon Prime Day deals had two reference prices – either a Recommended Retail Price (RRP) or Was Price, as well as a non-member price. It's unusual to have two reference prices, and it isn't clear which one is closer to the price that Amazon normally charges, which could be confusing for shoppers.  

We took these higher reference prices and calculated how many days they had been charged as the actual selling price in the six months leading up to the sale.

RRPs under scrutiny

We found 19% of the products in our investigation had not been sold at the RRP or Was Price (or greater) on the Amazon UK website in the six months prior. And of those that had, that higher reference price had only been in place on average for a third of the time.

Examples we found included: 

• A bottle of Ciroc Premium Vodka (70cl) was in the Amazon Prime sale at £19, with an RRP of £39 and a non-member price of £28. But it had not been sold at £39 on Amazon in the previous six months. The highest was £30.99.
• An Apple Watch Ultra 3 was £649 in the Amazon Prime sale, with an RRP of £749. But it hadn't been £749 in the six months prior on Amazon, in fact, the highest it had got was £729.
• A Lay-Z-Spa Helsinki Smart AirJet Plus Inflatable Round Hot Tub was £558 in the Prime sale with a £729.99 RRP. But the closest it got to that RRP in the six months prior on Amazon was £729 for one day. Otherwise it was £649.99 or less. 

This leads us to believe the RRP or Was Price may not be the best indicator of savings shoppers are making in the Amazon Prime sale, at least in relation to their previous selling prices on Amazon.  

What about the non-member price?

The non-member price was a better indicator of the savings than the RRP. All of the products in our investigation had been sold at the non-member price (or greater) at least once in the six months before the deal. 

Although, on average, these were sold at (or above) the non-member price just 48% of the time – meaning that most of the time the saving would have been less.

We tracked prices during the six months before 23 June 2026, using an independent pricing provider.

• Find out more: how to get the best price when shopping online

Is Amazon Prime worth signing up for? 

Amazon Prime costs £8.99 a month, or £95 for a year, which will save you £12.88 over 12 months, in comparison to the monthly payment option. Students and anyone aged between 18 and 22 are eligible for a Prime Student membership at £4.49 per month.

If you time it well, you can sign up for 30 days of Amazon Prime for free once the Prime Day sales begin, and then cancel for free before you get charged. If you don't cancel within the 30 days, you'll automatically be switched onto a regular Amazon Prime membership and charged £8.99 a month. 

It includes various delivery options, Prime Video, photo storage, music and podcasts – as well as exclusive deals.  

Although our research found that Amazon Prime Day deals seem to offer a good price, we think shoppers should take care when looking at the reference prices that Amazon uses to show the savings they might be getting.

You can also check a product's pricing history yourself, using CamelCamelCamel for Amazon and Price Runner for wider market coverage.

As always, our advice for any sale is to look at the price you are paying and not the supposed savings you are making.  

What does Amazon say?

When we put our findings to Amazon, it said: 'We offer customers great value all year round by comparing our prices against other retailers to make sure that our prices are as low or lower, as well as offering deal events like Prime Day that offer savings on hundreds of thousands of items. 

'All 32 items investigated by Which? were cheaper during Prime Day than they had been in the previous 30 days. 

'Amazon deal savings are based on validated reference prices, and we provide clear pricing information on product pages to help customers make informed purchasing decisions. 

'We also give customers the ability to verify pricing for themselves – our price history feature shows up to 365 days of pricing data on millions of products, so customers can see exactly how a product's price has changed on Amazon before they buy.'