Black Friday deals 2024: date and deals to expect

Black Friday 2024 takes place on Friday, November 29. The actual date shifts, but the day of the week stays the same: it's always the Friday after Thanksgiving.

Like in years past, Black Friday deals start as early as October as retailers launch early sales, trying to stretch out the holiday shopping season. Amazon's October Prime Day sale, which will take place on October 8 and 9, has put early Black Friday deals into motion as retailers like Walmart, Best Buy, and Target launch competing sales. 

While Black Friday proper falls on November 29 this year, thanks to Amazon's second Prime Day sale, we should start to see deals pop up as early as October.

Dubbed 'Prime Big Deal Days, ' the retailer recently announced that the 48-hour sale will occur on October 8 and 9. Like in years past, we expect competing retailers like Best Buy, Walmart, and Target to launch competing sales, which will extend the Black Friday shopping season.

While the adage is that retailers reserve their best deals for Black Friday proper, that hasn't been the case in recent years. We expect to see record-low prices on some of this year's best-selling tech, home items, and appliances released throughout October and November, and you'll be able to shop all the best early deals in this guide.

I'll be tracking early sales launching in the lead-up to Black Friday, listing all the best offers and comparing prices so you can make sure you're buying a genuine bargain.

Black Friday is the biggest shopping event of the year, thanks to hundreds of online retailers offering a wide variety of items on sale. Whether you're shopping for tech gadgets, this year's hottest kitchen appliance, or Christmas gifts for your family, you can guarantee you'll find a discount during Black Friday.

According to Adobe Analytics, some of the best Black Friday deals are on tech products, with electronics leading the way for the biggest consumer spending. This is due to pricey items like TVs, laptops, headphones, smartwatches, and gaming consoles getting discounted to record-low prices you won't find outside of Black Friday.

Apple devices are also extremely popular during Black Friday with fresh discounts on brand-new 2024 gadgets and best-ever offers on older model products. Other popular categories include clothing, furniture, home appliances, and toys.

As a deals editor, this will be my seventh year covering Black Friday, and the most popular deals I've seen always include budget big-screen TVs, OLED displays, robot vacuums, cheap smart home devices, AirPods, air fryers, and gaming consoles.

I expect we'll see the same mix of products on sale at this year's Black Friday deals event, and I'll be covering all the best offers in this guide.

Most online retailers offer Black Friday deals, but it's our job to sort through the thousands of offers to find the best bargains. You'll typically find the best Black Friday deals from big-name retailers like Walmart, Best Buy, and Target, with Amazon leading the pack.

Amazon is a Black Friday favorite not only because it typically offers the most competitive prices but also because of the wide variety of products it covers. Whether you're looking for tech items like laptops, TVs, or AirPods or searching for discounts on clothing, kitchen appliances, or toys, Amazon is likely to offer Black Friday deals on the product you're after. Other retailers that offer impressive Black Friday deals include Best Buy, Walmart, Target, Dell, Home Depot, Lowe's, and Wayfair.

With so many retailers and promotions, Black Friday can be overwhelming, but that's where our deal expertise comes in. We go through every retailer to pick out the very best Black Friday deals so you can make sure you're getting the lowest price available.

Let’s take a history lesson to find how why they call it Black Friday: the first known mention of Black Friday related to this shopping experience was in November 1951, when the journal Factory Management and Maintenance used it to describe people calling in sick the day after Thanksgiving so they could have an extra day off work. 

At the same time, US police were using the phrases “Black Friday” and “Black Saturday” to describe the horrendous traffic that occurred at the beginning of the pre-Christmas shopping season. 

In 1961, the local government moved to change the shopping season to “Big Friday” and “Big Saturday,” but it never caught on. The notion that it was the time when retailers moved 'back into the black' was seen far later and clearly an attempt to bring positivity to the term.