Best Early Black Friday Deals Under $100

The Keurig K-Mini Plus is a great little brewer that’s ideal for small kitchens with limited counter space. In our tests, it receives strong scores for temperature and size consistency between cups, as well as how easy it is to use and clean. It features a removable reservoir, a height-adjustable drip tray, and auto-shutoff.

The price of this coffee maker didn’t go any higher at Target during the entire month of July, so you definitely shouldn’t pay more than this anytime. You have to be a Circle member to get the deal right now, however.

This self-cleaning countertop icemaker makes nine bullet-shaped ice cubes in just 6 minutes. Two of the coolest aspects of this appliance are that you can make large or small ice cubes and it has a self-cleaning function. Choose from seven shades: black, black transparent, green, red, silver, stainless steel, or white.

This icemaker is now at the lowest price we’ve seen all year.

At just 5 inches wide, the Keurig K-Slim is an especially sleek and compact pod coffee machine that performed admirably in our tests. It brews speedily and consistently in terms of cup size, and our testers found it intuitive to operate and clean. It’s a little inconsistent in terms of temperature. But with four brew sizes, a height-adjustable drip tray, and a removable water reservoir, it’s an efficient and effective coffee maker. It was $20 less recently, but this is still better than full price if you’re looking for a single-serve coffee maker.

The NuWave Brio, now just $6 more than it was during the last big sale, is an air fryer with especially easy-to-use controls that make it simple to adjust temperature and time during the cooking process. In our tests, we also found it to be pretty quiet when operating. Its measured capacity is 2.9 quarts, so it’s not the right air fryer if you like cooking for a crowd, but it’s perfect for small batches of fries or vegetables, or cooking dinner for one or two people. It comes with an impressive 100 programmed cook settings for specific foods and 50 memory slots to save your temperature and cooking time preferences. It’s dishwasher-safe and comes with a one-year warranty.

The Cuisinart Countdown Metal CPT-415 snags the top rating in our color-range tests, popping up toast just as you like it. There are settings for bagels, defrost, and reheat, and Cuisinart’s 3-year warranty is longer than that of most brands in our ratings.

If you need a blender for simple meal prep tasks, $20 off might be a good incentive to try Ninja BN701 with Auto iQ. Just note that it was $10 less in the recent sales, so may dip down again during Black Friday and Cyber Monday. This is a 1,400-watt model that our tests confirm purees better than its other functions. The 9-cup blender has seven speeds; presets for smoothies, ice crush and ice cream; and it comes with a removable blade, plastic travel jar, and a recipe guide.

Apple has unveiled a fourth-generation edition of its classic buds, but the third-generation AirPods remain a solid choice, especially at under $100. They offer decent sound quality and the same easy compatibility with Apple devices. The ear tips have pressure-sensitive squeeze controls, plus sensors that prevent them from playing when they’re not in your ears. The buds come standard with a charging case that’s compatible with wireless chargers.

This wireless Bluetooth iPod/iPad/cellphone-centric model from JBL is a solid pick. The JBL Tune 660NC delivers very good sound quality and excellent active noise reduction. These headphones have a closed design, they will provide some muffling and electronic canceling of external noises and also reduce the amount of sound that escapes from the headphones.

The Beats Studio Buds from Beats by Dre deliver great sound quality and superb active noise reduction, which combine elements of in-ear and earbud earphones. These earphones have an isolating design and an ambient sound monitoring feature. They’re best for those who want highly portable earphones that reduce the amount of noise they hear from their surroundings.

They were $20 less during the last big sale, so you can most likely expect a better deal during Black Friday if you’d rather wait.

Much like trackers made by Samsung and Tile, AirTags work best if you’re looking for one within Bluetooth range (roughly 30 feet) of your own phone. But, that said, there are millions of iPhones and other Apple devices roaming around out there that can pick up a signal and discreetly convey it to you when you find yourself searching, say, a park or a school campus for the keys you dropped. Is the tracking pinpoint accurate? No. But it’s close enough to give you a little peace of mind.

This four-pack typically costs $80, so you’re not saving too much, but this is only $3 more than the best price we’ve seen, making it a good deal anyway.

If you prefer Google Assistant to Alexa, the Google Nest Audio may be a good choice. Alexa smart speakers have a wider variety of skills and can be great for shopping on Amazon, but some users like Google’s powerful search function and find Google’s interface to be more natural and easier to use.

This is the price for the all-black model. The white model is on sale for a few dollars more.

Google brags about the Nest Audio’s sonic performance, but our testers find that the gains are more modest. The speaker generates enough volume for a midsized room, but the midrange is a little hazy and there’s some sizzle on the high frequencies. While it’s better than the old Google Home, the Nest Audio still can’t compete with the best-sounding smart speakers. It also doesn’t sound quite as good as the similarly priced fourth-generation Amazon Echo.

Situated right below the Roku Streaming Stick 4K+ model, the Roku Streaming Stick 4K has most of the same features—including improved WiFi, support for HDR10+ and Dolby Vision HDR, and the ability to work with Amazon Alexa, Apple AirPlay, and Google Assistant voice assistant—but not the new rechargeable Voice Remote Pro remote control. Instead, you get a standard Roku voice remote, which lacks the hands-free operation, a headphone jack for private listening, and a lost-remote finder feature found on the Voice Remote Pro.

Our evaluator found that this monitor from KYY connected easily to her Mac, Windows, Android, iPad, and Switch devices and has the same scroll wheel device for accessing the OSD settings. On the KYY, rich reds look brownish. The folio cover on the KYY doesn’t fold correctly, either, due to weak magnets. Still, if you’re looking for a utilitarian device for extra desktop space and don’t want to spend a lot of money, the KYY Portable Monitor is worth considering.

Looking for a really good, inexpensive small speaker? The JBL Flip 6 is very similar to the venerable Flip 5, and that’s a good thing. It’s water- and dust-resistant, has a 12-hour battery life, and is just the right size to slip into a bag or even the water bottle pocket on a backpack. It’s a solid buy at $130, and that much better at just under $100—though it was $80 during Walmart’s October sale.

Hot Tools hair styling tools are a common sight at hair salons and for good reason. Our evaluators found that this flat iron heated up fast and was easy to use. It has variable heat settings to give users more control, and the plates are slightly longer than most straighteners, a feature that could be useful for styling longer hair. It’s important to note that the temperature consistency isn’t reliable and could vary by as much as 20 degrees from the set temperature during use. It has a 2-hour window before it automatically shuts off, so you’ll want to remember to unplug it after every use.

The Coop Home Goods Premium Adjustable Loft Pillow is made of shredded memory foam and excels in our tests for support, no matter your size or sleep position. The Coop also keeps its shape well, showing little to no change in height or fluffiness in our resilience tests. Each pillow comes with extra foam, so you can adjust the filling to your liking. The only area where this pillow falls a bit short is in breathability—it sleeps slightly warm.

This sheet set was recently on sale for $116, but just dropped an additional $29, making it a great time to get a new set. You’re going to experience quite a bit of wrinkling with the Hotel Collection Egyptian cotton sheets, but if you don’t mind pulling out the steamer to get your sheets smooth, you have a winner with this set. It provides a great fit for mattresses up to 10 inches thick, and it can withstand quite a bit of stretching and pulling. Plus, it aced our shrinkage test—just one of five cotton sheets in our ratings to do so.

Want to cuddle up in your bath towel? Get the Brooklinen Super-Plush (sold in a pair), available at 25 percent off. These guys are huge. At 53 inches long and 28 inches wide, the Brooklinen towel is what you want to wrap yourself in when the temps are below freezing and the thought of stepping out of a steaming warm shower onto an ice-cold floor chills your heart. These towels were the most absorbent in our evaluation, but they also took the longest to dry.

The Lerekam Solar Spot Lights are among the priciest outdoor spotlights we’ve reviewed, but our tests found they offered tremendous performance. They can be angled, installed with ground spikes (included), or screwed to other surfaces. They have an on/off button and can be recharged with a USB cable (also included). Each of the lights in the six-pack has 40 LEDs, resulting in intense white light that shines wide over an area, not unlike a flashlight. 

Nearly $20 less than it has been in recent weeks, this carry-on is a great deal right now. At 5.7 pounds, the American Tourister Wavebreaker 20" Spinner is the lightest hard-shell carry-on in our ratings. Yet, it’s a sturdy traveler. We found it to have top-quality construction, and it performed admirably in our evaluations of impact resistance, ergonomics and design, and safety. But with just two interior pockets, no built-in lock, and no expanding middle, it’s only so-so for usability. Its telescoping handle has only two positions, which contributes to a middling score for carrying and pulling. The manufacturer’s listed dimensions of 23x18x11 inches—with its telescopic handle stowed—are a bit bigger than the carry-on dimension requirements of most domestic airlines.

With its relatively low price and admirable test performance, the expandable Amazon Basics 21-inch Hardside Spinner is a worthwhile pick for those who don’t care about the bells and whistles. It aced most durability tests and had strong scores in our assessments for usability, carrying and pulling, construction quality, ergonomics and design, and safety.

The partial triangle handle and adjustable massage head on this Renpho massage gun make it easy for users to more comfortably target hard-to-reach areas of the body, and it’s light. This inexpensive device isn’t particularly powerful, but its moderate massage should still be sufficient for many users. It’s straightforward to use, with one button to change speeds. While it does very well in our evaluations of handle ergonomics, postural stress, and ease of use, it doesn’t have the premium feel of some of the more expensive devices we’ve tested. Changing the attachments feels a little clunky and can take a lot of force.

This is the same low price that’s usually available when this goes on sale.

The Renpho R3 massage gun might be the best all-around device for most average users because it’s small, lightweight, and quieter than other devices. But it’s not the ideal choice for people who want the most intense massage or the best model to massage areas on the back. 

The pistol grip could add some more postural stress than other devices, though its light weight and small form could help alleviate stress for some. As a bonus, this can be charged with a standard USB-C charging cable.

This is the same low price that’s usually available when this goes on sale.

To make your holiday light display really pop this year, consider the Twinkly Strings. We tried out these lights a few years ago and found them to be a fun way to put on an elaborate light show. The lights connect to WiFi, so you can customize them from your smartphone, but they also work with Amazon Alexa, Apple Home/Siri, and Google Home/Assistant.

The August Smart Lock, now just $5 more than during the big sale, is a retrofit model, meaning it replaces only the interior thumb-turn side of your home’s deadbolt. (The benefit of this? You can keep your current house keys and let the exterior side of the deadbolt continue to match your front door’s knob or handles.) This August model does quite well in our tests, especially when it comes to its ease of connectivity and many convenience features. Those features include auto-lock, auto-unlock, an access log to track who comes and goes, and electronic keys for guests. But this deal doesn’t include the August Connect WiFi Bridge, $79, which adds remote control via the August app and voice control via Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant.

The compact, battery-powered TP-Link Tapo MagCam C425 performs well in our tests and offers local storage via microSD card (up to 512 gigabytes; sold separately). The “bullet-style” camera features person detection, pet detection, vehicle detection, monitoring zones, color night vision (even when the built-in spotlights are off), a built-in siren, and voice and app control via Amazon Alexa and Google Home/Assistant. Best of all, you don’t need to sign up for a subscription to use any of these features. TP-Link also sells a $40 solar panel that can be connected to the camera to keep the battery charged. It’s $10 more now than it was recently, so the price may improve for Black Friday weekend.

The Synergy crib, now $30 less than it’s ever been, comes in an array of colors, including mint, cherry, and natural. It’s made of New Zealand pine wood and features three mattress support heights that we found mostly simple to change. It converts to a daybed, toddler bed, and full-sized bed, so your child would be able to sleep in the Synergy until they leave for college, provided it can withstand 18 years of childhood (we haven’t tested this). You’ll need to buy separate conversion kits for the toddler and full-sized beds.

The Baby Trend Snap-N-Go Double is a stroller frame that can accommodate two car seats. It performed excellently in our safety tests, and it’s as easy to use as the single Snap-N-Go. But it’s a bit harder to maneuver, as double strollers tend to be. It’s easy to fold and unfold, though carrying it folded can be a little awkward. It’s compatible with a number of car-seat brands, and it meets Disney parks’ stroller size requirements.

This bottle warmer from Kiinde Kozii earned a top spot in our rankings. It uses a warm water bath to warm baby bottles, so like the other models we tested that employ this method, it did not overheat our formula. Even after we left the warmer running for 34 minutes after the warming program was complete, the formula reached a maximum temperature of only 103° F. The dial on the device shows users how much time is left in the warming program, ticking as the time progresses much like a typical kitchen timer does, so you always know when the device is still running through a program. Because you select only the warming time and not the amount or temperature of the milk, you’ll have to keep the warming time chart handy to know how long to set the device for.

This bottle sterilizer performed extremely well in our tests for both temperature and drying. Like other models we tested, it has an auto mode that runs both a sanitizing and drying cycle (though it doesn’t have a HEPA filter), and it also has selectable drying times. It has three possible configurations, thanks to an extra tray to hold bottle nipples and other items, but our testers found it less easy to use than other top models. It can fit up to 11 baby bottles, though there are only six prongs on the main tray to hold them in place and they’re very short, which doesn’t keep bottles quite as stable as models with taller prongs.

This Hauture sterilizer, now at the best price we’ve seen, performed the best of all the sterilizers we tested, and its design is intuitive and easy to use, too. Its auto mode runs both a sanitizing and a drying cycle, and a digital timer shows the progress. It also has selectable drying times and a storage mode that restarts the heated dry cycle periodically to keep items clean for up to 72 hours. You can fit up to 11 bottles in the sterilizer. They won’t have their own prong, but with that many bottles, they’ll be close enough together that they won’t fall over.

This HelloBaby model is one of the lower-priced video monitors to earn CR’s recommendation. The device has its own display and handles the video feed locally, so it doesn’t have the privacy and security issues of internet-connected models. It lacks a nightlight, but that’s hardly a deal breaker.

The PetLibro automatic pet feeder was easy to use and has an app that makes setting schedules and dispensing food a breeze. It dispenses accurate amounts of dry food for dogs or cats and has a voice recording feature that allows you to call your pet for meals.

A baby gate may be earmarked for kids but can achieve the same results for pets, especially when it comes to keeping them away from certain areas of a home. The Cumbor Auto Close is the top-rated baby safety gate in our tests. It’s made of steel and can be pressure-mounted or installed more securely using optional cup hardware. Among other pluses, it offers easy one-handed operation and a 180-degree swing. It’s very easy to install and received top scores in security and convenience as well.

This gate is back down to the lowest price we’ve seen this year