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Sure, Apple will give you a $50 Apple Gift Card with your purchase of an Apple Watch Series 11 or Apple Watch SE 3 this Black Friday, but are there better discounts out there on this wearable tech from competing retailers? Before you head to the Apple Store, check out what the other major chains (including Best Buy, Target, Walmart, and Amazon) have to offer.
For starters, Best Buy has one of the steepest Apple Watch markdowns of the year: $200 off the Apple Watch Ultra 2 (specifically the GPS + Cellular model). That takes its list price of $799 down to a slightly more appealing $599. It comes with 36 hours of battery life, a titanium chassis, water resistance up to 328 feet, and a ton of sensors to track things like ECG, skin temperature, ambient light, and depth.
The model for sale includes 64GB of internal storage, an OLED Retina display with a resolution of 410 x 502, and support for Apple Pay, all without a pesky carrier lock. Best Buy users have the Watch at a 4.8-star rating from more than 700 reviews, so if you've been looking for a reason to see if it really lives up to that high praise, $200 might just be the motivation you need.
Target is offering $50 off an Apple Watch Series 11 or SE 3
Apple
Like Apple, Target will also reward you with $50 for purchasing an Apple Watch Series 11 or Apple Watch SE 3. But, instead of giving it to you in the form of a store gift card, Target's simply slashing it off the total price. (That $50 Apple gift card is kind of frustrating by comparison, because it would be so much nicer to just use it toward the big purchase you're making.) And whereas Best Buy gives you a greater discount, it doesn't apply to the Series 11 or SE 3... only the Ultra 2.
The discount on the Apple Watch SE 3 is a nice incentive for anyone curious about this smartwatch that was already designed to be more affordable than its sister products. It still gives you many of the sensors and features you look to Apple Watch for, just with an 18-hour battery life, a smaller screen, and slightly less advanced tech inside and out. (Both the SE 3 and the Series 11 use the same S10 chip, though, so it's not like it's all that significantly hobbled.)
The Apple Watch Series 10 is 50% off at Walmart
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If you don't need the latest and greatest Apple Watch on your wrist, Walmart slashed the price of the Apple Watch Series 10 by 50% for Black Friday. That's 2024's model, but it still gives you the choice of either GPS or GPS + Cellular with ECG functionality, blood oxygen monitoring, cycle tracking, and other Vitals app metrics. It comes with Apple's standard 18-hour battery life, a larger display for the Series 10 vs the Series 9, and a crack-resistant, dust-resistant, water-resistant build (up to 50 meters, at least).
Walmart will give you the discount for either edition of the Series 10, but the discount is much more impressive for the GPS + Cellular version: $250 off instead of just $150 off for the GPS version. It's actually a pretty great deal. Even though the Series 11 introduced new watchOS 11 features as well as better durability and health tools, the Series 10 isn't some drastic step down comparatively. And at 50% off, why not shed a few new features in exchange for an awesome sale price?
Amazon's also taking $50 off Series 11s and SE 3s
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If you'd rather shop on Amazon than at Target, the online retailer is also offering $50 off the Apple Watch Series 11. (Amazon's SE 3s are also $50 off.) The Series 11 remains an Amazon's Choice product with more than 10,000 units sold in the past month, so this discount is probably only going to make those move even faster out of the warehouse. The Series 11's feature set includes an Always-On display, a 24-hour battery life, scratch resistance improvements over the Series 10, 5G connectivity with compatible carriers, Apple Intelligence access, and updated health tools including ECG, blood oxygen, and sleep score monitoring. And among other Amazon Black Friday deals on Apple, this $50 price drop ranks pretty highly.
So, to review: Best Buy will give you the steepest discount on dollar amount (but exclusively for the Ultra 2), Walmart will give you the largest percentage off (but only for the Series 10), and Target and Amazon have a similar discount to Apple with their matching offer of $50 off the Series 11 and SE 3 watches. Apple's promo still stands, too, of course: a $50 gift card with the purchase of a Series 11 or SE 3.
