Here’s a peek at the best back-to-school deals on Amazon ahead of Prime Day:
BEST BACKPACK DEAL: The stylish and durable JanSport Cortlandt 15-inch Laptop Backpack has never been this cheap before — $34.94 $55 (save 36%)
BEST LAPTOP DEAL: Last year’s Samsung Chromebook 4 is a lightweight laptop with built-in virus protection and 32GB of storage. It’s only $9 away from its all-time low price — $128 $229.99 (save 44%)
BEST DEAL ON SCHOOL SUPPLIES: It’s cheaper to buy a 12-pack of Mead Wide Ruled Spiral Notebooks (1 subject) on Amazon than from Mead directly — $21.49 $33 (save 35%)
HONORABLE MENTION: Sign up for a six-month trial of Amazon Prime Student (normally $7.49/month) to unlock free access to Gruhhub+, Kindle Unlimited, LinkedIn Premium, Calm Premium, and Course Hero, among other perks.
Looking for some decent deals on back-to-school essentials this Prime Day? You’re going to have to do some digging.
While Amazon has a ton of pens, pencils, folders, notebooks, and binders listed “on sale” ahead of its annual two-day event (which is scheduled for July 12 and 13 this year), data we examined on the price-tracking site camelcamelcamel revealed that most of them were actually still hovering around their historical averages. Kind of surprising, considering there have been some legitimately good deals across most of its other departments.
Take this Crayola marker set, for example: It looks like a good deal at $15.97 since Amazon’s pegged its MSRP at $23.98. But if you plug its URL into camelcamelcamel, you’ll see that it’s previously sold for an average of $15.33. Not such a good deal after all.
Credit: Screenshot via Amazon
You might have better luck overall at Target and Walmart, which both recently kicked off some back-to-school savings events. But for those of us who want to take full advantage of that $139/year Prime membership fee, there are still some diamonds in the metaphorical rough.
Keep reading for an overview of the most worth-it back-to-school deals on Amazon that we managed to scrounge up.
Note: We’re updating this page constantly, so check back often. All newly added deals are marked with a ✨, while deals with a strikeout were either sold out or no longer available at their sale price when we last looked. Anything marked with a 🔥 has dropped to an all-time low price.
Backpack deals
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Our pick: JanSport Cortlandt 15-inch Laptop Backpack 🔥
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Why we like it
Highly functional but still stylish (peep the vegan leather trim), JanSport’s top-rated Cortlandt backpack includes a decent amount of storage: There’s a main compartment with a padded sleeve that can fit a 15-inch laptop, a front accessory pocket, and a secondary flap pocket with an organizer for cords and small electronics.
The Viking Red one is sitting at an all-time low price ahead of Prime Day: You can grab it off Amazon for just $34.94, which is 36% off its suggested retail price of $55.
More early Prime Day deals on backpacks
Champion Manuscript Backpack — $21.99 $40 (save 45%)
adidas Originals Trefoil 2.0 Backpack — $35.10 $45 (save 22%) 🔥
adidas Prime Backpack — $48.75 $65 (save 25%) 🔥
Carhartt Force Pro 35L Backpack — $79.19 $119.99 (save 31%) 🔥
Laptop deals
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Our pick: Samsung Chromebook 4
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Why we like it
As some of the most secure devices on the market, Chromebooks make great starter laptops for kids. This well-reviewed Samsung model from 2021 isn’t anything fancy, but its 12.5-hour battery life, 32GB of storage, military-grade durability, and some built-in virus protection will serve grade- and middle-schoolers quite well. It also weighs in at only 2.6 pounds, so little arms won’t have trouble hauling it around.
Order one through Amazon ahead of Prime Day for only $128. That’s 44% off its $229.99 MSRP and just $9 away from its all-time low price from May.
More early Prime Day deals on laptops
Renewed Samsung Chromebook 3 (Intel Celeron N3060, 4GB RAM, 16GB eMMC) — $83.48 $189.99 (save 56%)
HP 14 Laptop (Intel Celeron N4020, 4GB RAM, 64GB eMMC) — $209 $259.99 (save 20%) 🔥
Acer Aspire 5 (Intel Core i3-1115G4, 4GB DDR4, 128GB NVMe SSD) — $289.99 $389.99 (save 26%)
ASUS Chromebook Flip C434 (Intel Core M3-8100Y, 4GB RAM, 64GB eMMC) — $389.73 $569.99 (save 32%) 🔥
Acer Aspire 5 (Intel Core i5-1135G7, Intel Iris Xe Graphics, 8GB DDR4, 256GB SSD) — $549.99 $649.99 (save 15%) 🔥
School supply deals
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Our pick: Mead Wide Ruled Spiral Notebook (1 subject), 12 Pack
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Why we like it
Mead sells a 12-pack of wide-ruled, one-subject spiral notebooks for $33 on its website, but Amazon will give ’em to you for just $21.49 — a 35% savings.
More early Prime Day deals on school supplies
Crayola Construction Paper, 96 sheets — $2.46 $4.29 (save 43%)
Elmers Liquid School Glue (4 ounces), 12 Count — $6.60 $32.59 (save 80%)
Paper Mate Profile Retractable Ballpoint Pens, Bold Point (1.4mm), Assorted, 12 Count — $7.79 $12.49 (save 38%)
Elmer’s Disappearing Purple School Glue Stick, 30 Pack — $8.27 $25.29 (save 67%)
Amazon Basics Heavy Duty Plastic Folders, 12 Pack — $12.71 $14.24 (save 11%)
Texas Instruments TI-84 Plus Graphing Calculator — $109.79 $139.99 (save 23%)
Texas Instruments TI-84 Plus CE Color Graphing Calculator — $119 $150 (save 21%)
Honorable mention: Sign up for a free six-month trial of Amazon Prime Student
A friendly reminder that anyone with an .edu email address can score a six-month trial of Amazon Prime Student, which unlocks Prime Day access, free two-day shipping, and several bonus offers in addition to standard Prime benefits. (That includes free Grubhub delivery, six months of LinkedIn Premium, three months of Calm Premium, two months of Kindle Unlimited, a month’s worth of homework help from Course Hero, and discounts on flights and hotels from StudentUniverse.) Check out our guide on how to sign up.