Everything you need to know about Black Friday: Best deals, where to shop, and more

UPDATE: Nov. 24, 2023, 7:00 a.m. EST This story has been updated with FAQ information about Black Friday sales, plus a selection of Mashable editors' choice Black Friday deals.

What is Black Friday?

Black Friday is a shopping holiday that takes place every year on the day right after Thanksgiving. It used to be synonymous with late-night stampedes, viral fistfights, and long lines of tents pitched outside of department stores because the best doorbusters were available exclusively in person. But many retailers have made their Black Friday deals available online in recent years, turning it into a hybrid event; you can score great deals by camping out on a store's website instead of its literal doorstep nowadays.

Modern Black Fridays have also tended to spill well beyond the bounds of their traditional single-day slots. It's not abnormal to see retailers offering "early Black Friday deals" and "Black Friday preview deals" even before Halloween to keep things ultra-competitive.

When does Black Friday start?

Black Friday technically falls on Friday, Nov. 24 this year, but holiday sales began as early as mid-October at several stores.

Best Buy, the first retailer to announce its Black Friday programming back in October, is taking the most aggressive approach. Its four-part holiday calendar began on Oct. 27 with Black Friday Early Access for Members, a weekend of exclusive access to select deals for paid members of its My Best Buy program, then moved into a general Black Friday Deals for Everyone event on Oct. 30. The full Best Buy Black Friday sale began on Friday, Nov. 17, and will be followed by its Cyber Monday Savings Event on Sunday, Nov. 26.

Best Buy's early Black Friday deals will be supplemented with short sales and hard-to-find releases on its smartphone app as part of its new Best Buy Drops program for the holidays. It also hosted a new series of livestream shopping events featuring popular gift ideas and limited-time deals on the first three Wednesdays in November.

Target came up to bat next, just before Halloween, unveiling its plans to offer four weeks of early Black Friday deals ahead of the actual holiday. Exclusive discounts and Deals of the Day for members of its free Target Circle loyalty program will be peppered in throughout the holiday season.

Walmart ran two Black Friday Deals events in Nov.: The first sale started online on Wednesday, Nov. 8, and continued in stores on Friday, Nov. 10; the second one went live on Wednesday, Nov. 22 before popping up in stores on Friday, Nov. 24. Both events include three hours of early access for paid (non-trial) Walmart+ members.

Meanwhile, Amazon geared up to host its own extended Black Friday sale which began on Friday, Nov. 17, and will shift into its Cyber Monday sale on Saturday, Nov. 25. According to its press release, new deals will drop "as often as every five minutes during select periods" during the events, and a handful of limited-time doorbusters will be available during the New York Jets/Miami Dolphins football game on Black Friday (available to stream on Prime Video).

Are things actually cheaper on Black Friday?

The Mashable Shopping team researches and reports on deals constantly throughout the year, and while we see many items go on sale at deep discounts in the weeks leading up to Black Friday, we always encounter new record lows on the day of. That said, an item on your wish list may be worth buying during a pre-Black Friday sale it's a popular gift or already abnormally cheap: Products that sell out ahead of time aren't always restocked for the actual event.

How to find the best Black Friday deals

Price-tracking sites and coupon-hunting browser extensions can do a lot of the heavy lifting for you — our favorites include Honey, SlickDeals, Keepa, and camelcamelcamel. We'll also be keeping track of the best Black Friday deals ourselves right here on this page once they start bubbling up, so bookmark it for future reference.

If you want to seek out deals yourself, keep an eye out for dedicated Black Friday landing pages on retailers' websites. These serve as hubs for their best offers.

How long does Black Friday last?

If you ask the reporters and editors who have been covering this event, the answer is 84 years. In truth, Black Friday is no longer just on Friday — since retailers started rolling out their deals in October, we can honestly say that Black Friday is now a two-month affair.

Once the clock strikes midnight on Black Friday though, see ya later. After that, everything switches into Cyber Monday mode. The deals are largely the same, but the search terms are now totally different.

When does Cyber Monday start?

Cyber Monday officially starts on Monday, Nov. 27 in 2023, but the online push for shopping holidays over the last few years has meant that they all kind of blur together. We wouldn't be surprised if retailers began using Cyber Monday or Cyber Weekend language as early as Saturday, Nov. 25.

Black Friday versus Cyber Monday — what's the difference?

The National Retail Federation officially coined the term "Cyber Monday" in 2005 after it noticed that in previous years, the Monday after Thanksgiving saw a massive uptick in online sales. It credited the phenomenon to two factors: Online retailers were starting to vie for a slice of the Black Friday pie, and shoppers were waiting to peruse the deals on their faster work computers come Monday morning. (At the time, office PCs had better broadband than home setups.)

There's little difference between Black Friday and Cyber Monday these days because of the former's shift online, and based on our experience, neither is a categorically "better" day to shop. Sometimes it's worth waiting to see if an item you find on sale during Black Friday goes on sale at an even cheaper price on Cyber Monday — but again, you also run the risk of it selling out.

Mashable Editor's Choice Black Friday deals

If you're looking for the monster list of all the Black Friday deals we could find across all the biggest retailers, head over to our Black Friday mega post. Below, you'll find a curated selection of the Mashable editors' favorite Black Friday deals:

Best Black Friday Apple deal

Why we like it

If you're looking for the "sweet spot" of iPad models, you'll find it in the iPad Air, according to Mashable's Stan Schroeder. It has an M1 chip, which will power you through tasks like gaming and audio editing without a hitch — and it won't cost you the $800-plus that an iPad Pro with the same chip would. This base model is slightly on the smaller side when it comes to storage, but luckily, the 256GB Air is also on sale for $99 off — which still puts it a good $150 below the 128GB iPad Pro. Basically, if you want something a bit less basic than the standard iPad but don't want to shell out, the Air is your perfect in-between. And at $499.99, it's back down to its lowest price ever — and the price we saw it sit at for the entirety of Prime Day.

Read our full review of the 2022 iPad Air.

More Black Friday Apple deals

AirPods

• Apple AirPods (3rd generation) with Lightning Charging Case — $139.99 $169 (save $29.01) ✨

• AirPods Pro (2nd generation) with USB-C Charging Case — $189.99 $249 (save $59.01) ✨

Apple Watches

• Apple Watch Series 9 (GPS, 41mm) — $329 $399 (save $70) ✨

• Apple Watch Series 9 (GPS + cellular, 41mm) — $429 $499 (save $70) ✨

• Apple Watch Series 9 (GPS + cellular, 45mm) — $459 $529 (save $70) ✨

iPads

• 2021 iPad (WiFi, 64GB) — $229 $329 (save $100)

• 2022 iPad (WiFi, 64GB) — $349 $449 (save $100)

• 2021 iPad (WiFi, 256GB) — $399 $479 at Walmart (save $80)

• iPad Air (WiFi, 64GB) — $499.99 $599 at Amazon (save $99.01)

Best Black Friday Dyson deal

Why we like it

Sitting at $200 off at both Walmart and Dyson, the V15 Detect Absolute is one of our favorite vacuums. It's right in the sweet spot of price and suction power and features the coveted laser technology that shows you how disgusting your floors really are. The "Absolute" in this model means that it comes with a full slew of accessories: the Fluffy Optic laser head, the Digital Motorbar cleaner head, the hair screw tool, and three others, in addition to a wall dock.

Read our full review of the Dyson V15 Detect vacuum.

More Black Friday Dyson deals

Vacuums

• Dyson V8 Origin+ — $224.99 $419.99 (save $195)

• Dyson V8 Origin — $249.99 $429.99 (save $180) + free $25 Target gift card

• Dyson V11 — $399.99 $569.99 (save $170)

• Dyson Outsize Plus — $449.99 $599.99 (save $150)

Hair tools

• Dyson Supersonic hair dryer (Refurbished) — $229.99 $429.99 (save $200)

Best Black Friday Amazon device deal

Why we like it

Amazon is notorious for putting out great Echo bundles on Black Friday, and this year is no exception. This bundle would normally cost you about $113, but was marked down to just $39.99 at the time of writing. You'll score the 2023 version of the Echo Show 5 plus a Kasa Smart Color bulb. This bundle is the perfect budget-friendly way to test the smart home waters, but would also make an excellent white elephant gift.

More Black Friday Amazon device deals

Fire tablets

• Amazon Fire 7 tablet — $39.99 $59.99 (save $20)

• Amazon Fire 7 Kids tablet — $54.99 $109.99 (save $54.99)

• All-new Amazon Fire 10 Kids tablet — $124.99 $189.99 (save $65)

• All-new Amazon Fire HD 10 Kids Pro tablet — $124.99 $189.99 (save $65)

• Amazon Fire HD 10 tablet — $74.99 $149.99 (save $74.99)

• All-new Amazon Fire HD 10 tablet — $79.99 $139.99 (save $60)

• Amazon Fire HD 10 Plus tablet — $94.99 $179.99 (save $85)

• Amazon Fire HD 10 Plus tablet (no lockscreen ads) — $109.99 $194.99 (save $85)

• Amazon Fire HD 10 tablet and Stylus Pen — $114.98 $174.98 (save $60)

• Amazon Fire HD 8 tablet — $59.99 $99.99 (save $40)

• Amazon Fire HD 8 Plus tablet — $69.99 $119.99 (save $60)

Echo devices

• Echo Pop with TP-Link Kasa Smart Color Bulb — $17.99 $62.98 (save $44.99)

• Echo Dot (2022 release) — $22.99 $49.99 (save $27)

• Echo Dot (2022 release) Kids — $27.99 $59.99 (save $32)

• Amazon Echo Dot (5th Gen) with clock — $34.99 $59.99 (save $25)

• All-new Echo Show 5 (2023 release) — $39.99 $89.99 (save $50)

• All-new Echo Show 5 (2023 release) with Blink Mini — $44.99 $124.98 (save $79.99)

• Echo Show 5 (2023 release) Kids — $44.99 $99.99 (save $55)

• Echo Show 8 (2021 release) — $54.99 $129.99 (save $75)

• Echo Show 10 (3rd Gen) — $159.99 $249.99 (save $90)

Fire TV sticks

• Amazon Fire TV Stick - $19.99 $39.99 (save $20)

• All-new Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max — $39.99 $59.99 (save $20)

Eero devices

• Amazon Eero Mesh WiFi router - $44.99 $69.99 (save $25)

• Amazon eero 6+ mesh Wi-Fi system — $194.99 $299.99 (save $105)

• Amazon eero Pro 6E mesh Wi-Fi System — $399.99 $549.99 (save $150)

Kindle

• Amazon Kindle — $79.99 $99.99 (save $20)

• Amazon Kindle Scribe (32 GB) — $279.99 $389.99 (save $110)

Best Black Friday robot vacuum deal

Why we like it

You can bring home the triple threat that is automatic emptying, mopping, and small obstacle avoidance for less than $500 with this stellar deal on a mopping Roomba that just came out in September.

Compared to the Roomba j7+, the j5+'s obstacle detection cameras aren't quite as precise, and still may require you to pick up things like towels or socks, or put a virtual barrier around pet bowls. But to be able to skip skimming the floor for rogue cords and enjoy automatic emptying for less than $400, you can probably deal with ensuring laundry gets into the basket. As for the mopping, this is one of iRobot's new Swap and Mop models, which does require you to be home to physically click on the water tank when you want to mop.

More Black Friday robot vacuum deals

Standalone robot vacuums

• iHome AutoVac Juno — $85 $199 (save $114.99)

• iRobot Roomba 694 — $159 $274.99 (save $250)

• Shark Matrix — $199 $299.99 (save $100.99)

• Shark Matrix Plus 2-in-1 — $249.99 $449.99 (save $200)

• Roborock S8 — $599.99 $749.99 (save $150)

Self-emptying robot vacuums

• Shark Matrix — $299.99 $499.99 (save $200)

• iRobot Roomba i5+ — $349.99 $549.99 (save $200)

• Roborock Q5+ — $399.99 $699.99 (save $300)

• Shark Detect Pro RV2820AE — $449.99 $599.99 (save $150)

• iRobot Roomba s9+ — $599.99 $999.99 (save $400)

Self-emptying mopping robot vacuums

• Yeedi Vac Station — $299.99 $499.99 (save $200)

• iRobot Roomba Combo i5 — $229 $349.99 (save $150.99)

• iRobot Roomba Combo j5 — $349 $599.99 (save $250.99)

• Ecovacs N10+ — $399.99 $649.99 (save $250)

• Shark Matrix Plus 2-in-1 — $399.99 $699.99 (save $300)

• Yeedi Cube — $499.99 $699.99 (save $200)

• Ecovacs T9+ — $499.99 $799.99 (save $300)

• Roborock Q5 Pro+ — $499.99 $699.99 (save $200 with on-page coupon)

• Ecovacs Cube Pro — $599.99 $799.99 (save $200)

• Roborock Q8 Max+ — $599.99 $819.99 (save $220 with on-page coupon)

  Roborock Q Revo — $799.99 $899.99 (save $100 with on-page coupon)

• Eufy Clean X9 Pro — $649.99 $899.99 (save $250)

• Roborock S8+ — $799.99 $999.99 (save $200)

• Ecovacs Deebot T20 Omni — $799.99 $1,099.99 (save $300)

Best Black Friday headphones deal

Why we like it

Narrowing down a headphones upgrade from so many on-sale options is less overwhelming when you've confirmed that you want to stick with a super premium, super reputable brand like Bose — but also that you want to stick to a budget. There's only one pair of Bose over-ear headphones you can grab for just under $200, and that's the QuietComfort 45s at a record low price of $199. This classic pair secures top-of-the-line ANC, 20 hours of battery life, and all-day comfort for less than half the price of the AirPods Max.

More headphone deals

Over-ear and on-ear headphones

• JBL Tune 510BT — $24.95 $49.95 (save $25)

• JBL Tune 660NC — $49.95 $99.95 (save $50)

• JBL Live 460NC — $64.95 $129.95 (save $65)

• JBL Tune 760NC — $64.95 $129.95 (save $65)

• Marshall Major IV — $99.99 $149.99 (save $50)

• Beats Solo3 — $129.99 $199.95 (save $69.96)

• Beats Studio Pro — $169.95 $349.99 (save $180.04)

• Bose QuietComfort 45 — $199 $329 (save $130)

• Sony WH-1000XM4 — $248 $348 (save $100)

• Bose QuietComfort headphones — $249 $349 (save $100)

• Bose Headphones 700 — $259 $379 (save $120)

• Sennheiser Momentum 4 — $279.99 $379.95 (save $99.96)

• Sony WH-1000XM5 — $328 $399.99 (save $71.99)

• Bose QuietComfort Ultra — $379 $429 (save $50)

• AirPods Max — $449.99 $549 (save $99.01)

Earbuds

• JBL Vibe Beam — $29.95 $49.95 (save $20)

• OnePlus Nord Buds 2 — $29.99 $59.99 (save $30)

• Echo Buds (2023) — $34.99 $49.99 (save $15)

• JBL Tune Buds — $49.95 $99.95 (save $40)

• JBL Tune Flex — $49.95 $99.95 (save $40)

• Google Pixel Buds A-Series — $59 $99 (save $40)

• Jabra Elite 4 — $59.99 $99.99 (save $40)

• Echo Buds with ANC — $64.99 $119.99 (save $55)

• JBL Endurance Peak 3 — $69.95 $99.95 (save $30)

• Samsung Galaxy Buds FE — $69.99 $99.99 (save $30)

• Jabra Elite 4 Active — $69.99 $119.99 (save $60)

• JBL Live Pro 2 — $74.95 $149.95 (save $75)

• Jabra Elite 5 — $79.99 $149.99 (save $70)

• Sony WF-C700N — $88 $119.99 (save $31.99)

• JBL Reflect Aero — $89.95 $149.95 (save $60)

• Beats Studio Buds — $99.95 $149.95 at Amazon (save $50)

• Samsung Galaxy Buds 2 — $99.99 $149.99 (save $50)

• OnePlus Buds Pro 2 — $99.99 $179.99 (save $80)

• Google Pixel Buds Pro — $119.99 $199.99 (save $80)

• LG TONE Free Earbuds T90 — $129.99 $229.99 (save $100)

• Samsung Galaxy Buds 2 Pro — $159.99 $229.99 (save $70)

• Beats Powerbeats Pro — $149.95 $249.95 at Amazon (save $100)

• Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II — $199 $279 (save $80)

• Sony WF-1000XM5 — $248 $299.99 (save $51.99)

• Bose QuietComfort Ultra earbuds — $249 $299 (save $50)