Amazon’s Prime Day Chromebook deals are here! We’ve collected the best Prime Day sales on Chromebooks, with deals on both budget and premium machines.
Amazon Prime Day begins today, July 16, with Amazon and its partners discounting thousands of items. My job is to find the best Chromebook deals, and pass them along to you. I’ve also included juicy Chromebook discounts from rival retailers like Target, Newegg, and Best Buy. Using our recommendations for the best Chromebooks as a guide, I explain all my choices.
I’ve worked as a consumer tech editor for 30 years and I’ve been at PCWorld for the last decade. During that time, I’ve been responsible for compiling the best Chromebook deals for Prime Day, Black Friday, and more, and I’ve done deep reporting on the Chromebook ecosystem. I’m confident I can find the best Chromebook bargains.
To compile PCWorld’s list of Chromebook deals for Prime Day, I looked at the specifications, price, pricing history, the manufacturer, and any reviews we’ve published on a specific Chromebook. Read on for all the best Chromebook deals, and check out our Prime Day 2024 deals hub for great sales in other tech categories.
This story was first published on July 12, 2024, and last updated on July 16, 2024.
HP’s $169 deal is obviously the cheapest on our list, but if there’s one big Chromebook deal I’d recommend for Prime Day, it would be the Acer Spin 514 at the top. It checks all the boxes: solid screen, 8GB of RAM, and a competent processor. The Celeron N4500 inside the Asus CX1 is a slower chip, but not by that much. Both seem like solid deals.
The Acer Spin is a 360-degree foldable, while the Acer Chromebook Plus is a traditional clamshell. I’m recommending the Ryzen 3 version as the better deal, but the 2.6GHz Core i3-N305 will be faster than the 1.8GHz Ryzen 3, with more CPU threads as well. You can pay more for more CPU performance, if you prefer. All of these Amazon deals are well below the previous lowest price of the year.
For more information, you can also check out PCWorld’s review of the Chromebook Plus 514. Our review version uses the Intel N100 chip.
Best Buy traditionally has some killer deals, and buyers looking for a more premium Chromebook would do well to consider the Acer Chromebook 516, a macgine that will run even better on the lightweight Chrome OS. What a fantastic screen, too! The similarly Acer Spin 714 is also a good catch, although the display is better for the 516.
My colleagues have found some other great deals, so check out these great Prime Day roundups:
Expect to pay between $170 to $250 or so, depending on the configuration. You’ll see bargain-basement options below $100 and more premium versions will cost $300 and above. We’ve used that advice for the past few years, and even with inflation that still seems to hold true.
While some of the early Chromebook deals were pretty solid, the best deals are usually reserved for the Prime
I always start first with the screen, preferring a large 1080p display if the deal offers it. I also look for at least 8GB of RAM to maximize the available open tabs in a web browser and run necessary apps. I worry less about the microprocessor, as Chrome OS is lightweight and can run on an Intel Pentium and Celeron chip, an AMD chip, or Arm chips from Qualcomm and Mediatek. Anything powered by an Intel Core chip or AMD Ryzen (not an A-series) chip should deliver solid performance.
It’s a little trickier now since Chromebooks are now supported for ten years and some manufacturers see that as a green light to dump ancient hardware. That’s the sort of thing I keep a wary eye upon.
Generally, Chromebooks tend to fall into three categories: ultracheap models at about $100 to $200, which can offer solid discounts but can hide gotchas like a subpar screen; the typical midrange price of between $250 and $400; and premium Chromebooks at $500 or more. The latter are essentially PC laptops with Google’s Chrome OS on top, and might be too expensive for your tastes.
Our story recommending Chromebooks over Windows laptops may help you decide, as might our recommendations for the best Chromebooks. We have a more detailed comparison of laptops versus Chromebooks, too.
Chromebooks used to cut corners, especially where deals are concerned. Some still do. This $209 Asus Chromebook at Target uses an eight-year-old processor from 2016. I don’t want you to buy ancient hardware that won’t run well, so I pay attention to this. I also tend to avoid “renewed” hardware in favor of new, out-of-the-box devices.
I like to focus on the screen first, choosing deals that offer large, eye-pleasing 1080p displays. (A 768p screen can work, but it can be grainy). I like Chromebooks with at least 8GB of memory, but I’m less particular about the type of processor. You don’t need an Intel Core or AMD Ryzen chip, though you will see those in more premium Chromebooks. Arm chips from Qualcomm, Samsung, or Mediatek are more typical and offer longer battery life and decent performance. For a Chromebook, that’s enough.
Google Chrome OS-powered notebooks have a support window. Once closed, they will not receive any additional features, patches, security, or OS updates. However, Google recently extended this support window to a full 10 years, which really opens up the possibilities.
Amazon would like to think so. But if we relied solely on Amazon’s deals, you’d miss out! Many retails offers competitive deals during Prime Days and the week of Prime Day. If we find a Chromebook deal from another retailer, we’ll include it.
No. You may have a particular preference, but all Chromebooks that we cover are made by hardware makers with trusted reputations like HP, Samsung, Asus, and so on. If you trust a laptop brand, its Chromebooks should be equally trustworthy.
