The best Apple Black Friday deals in 2023: Offers on AirPods, iPads and more

It’s sales season, and Black Friday 2023 is kicking off early. Several retailers have launched Apple Black Friday deals ahead of time, and we’re already starting to see discounts on iPhones, Apple Watches and more.

The official Apple Store doesn’t like to get too involved with Black Friday, instead running its very own Apple Store Shopping Event concurrently with the sale. From Black Friday, 24 November, anyone who buys an eligible Apple product will receive a gift card worth up to £160 to use towards a later purchase.

Some of the products included in the promotion are the iPhone 14, the Apple Watch Series 9, the MacBook Air, the iPad and iPad Pro, AirPods, Beats headphones and Apple accessories. As you’d expect, the new iPhone 15 or the premium Apple Watch Ultra 2 are not included.

But you don’t have to wait for Apple’s Black Friday sale. There are already plenty of Black Friday discounts on the AirPods Pro, the Apple Watch Ultra, iPhone 14 line of smartphones and MacBook Pro 14 and 16in laptops with the M2 chip.

It’s not just Apple devices, either. There are lots of Black Friday price cuts across a whole host of tech, including laptops, TVs, wireless headphones and more. You can also find discounted home appliances – from coveted air fryers and dehumidifiers to vacuum cleaners (the robot variety included). 

Apple’s second-generation AirPods Pro 2 earbuds have plummeted under £200 for the first time ever. Our tech critic David Phelan said in his review that they offer extra features over the previous AirPods Pro from 2021, boasting better audio quality, stronger noise cancellation and better battery life. The biggest change in design applies to the charging case, which now has a loop on the side to enable you to attach a lanyard, and there’s a speaker on the underside to help you locate it with the Find My app. They were updated with new features in September.

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It might not be the newest iPhone in the range, but the iPhone 14 is still a powerful smartphone with some big internal upgrades over its predecessor. “This is a fast and attractive smartphone, with Apple’s excellent design and build quality, the now-routine features, such as water resistance and strong screen, and a significantly improved camera,” our writer said in their review of the handset. While Very says that you can save £115 on the device, it’s more like £50 given the 14 has had a price cut. Still, that’s a pretty sweet discount.

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Reduced by over £60, Apple’s 2022 iPad is one of the cheapest models you can buy. The 10th-generation tablet boasts a large 10.9in screen and full-sounding stereo speakers. Compatible with the Apple pencil and smart keyboard, the iPad is complete with a wide 12MP rear camera and an ultra-wide front camera for taking video calls. “The regular iPad features a new design, faster processor and a better and bigger display,” our writer said in their review. “It is easily worth the price and is a real rival to the iPad Air. This is the best tablet under £500 from any manufacturer, in my opinion.”

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Although it’s a few years old now, the MacBook air M1 is still sold by Apple, and Very has sliced off a handy £150 in its early Black Friday sale. This model of MacBook Air previously featured in our round-up of the best laptops. Our tester said: “The MacBook air is remarkably lightweight and slim, an effect made more appealing thanks to a tapering design – at its thinnest point, it’s 0.41cm thick. But the new version is the first to use Apple’s own silicon instead of an Intel processor. The M1 chip is breathtakingly fast.”

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Amazon has slashed the price of the original premium smartwatch, to coincide with the new Apple Watch Ultra 2 launching. Featuring double the battery life of other Apple Watches and a bigger screen, it was the first to be available in only titanium and with cellular connectivity. Now, you can save on the price at Amazon. “The display is fantastic, offering outstanding brightness and exceptional readability, thanks to the size and flatness of the screen. It’s called the Ultra because it does more than previous models – from crash detection to depth monitoring to having a design that works with thick gloves underwater, for instance,” our tech critic said in their review.

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We haven’t seen a pack of four AirTags drop this low since March, so if you’re an item loser like us, then now is the perfect time to pick up some of Apple’s AirTags with this £24 saving. The neat thing about the AirTag is that when you’re close enough, you can get real-time turn-by-turn directions to your item. “Precision tracking works wonderfully well when you can get a signal, and the fact it’s powered by removable batteries is a real bonus,” our writer said in their review. “There are just so many devices connected to the Find My network that you’ll always be able to locate your AirTag if it goes AWOL.”

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While the AirPods 2 have been superseded by the AirPods 3, the second-generation model still packs a punch, though they forgo the active noise cancellation found on the AirPods Pro. They’ve dropped to their lowest price for Black Friday. Our writer noted in their review that they are “some of the very lightest in-ears you can find”, adding that “the design is unchanged since day one, but improved electronics inside mean that, like on the pro model, you can say, ‘Hey, Siri’ to invoke the virtual assistant without even touching the earbuds”.

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Apple discounts are rare, so a saving of £70 on this iPad is a real gem. Reduced by nearly 15 per cent, Apple’s 2021 iPad is one of the cheapest models you can buy. The 9th generation tablet boasts a 10.2in screen and full-sounding stereo speakers. Compatible with the Apple Pencil and Smart Keyboard, the iPad is complete with a back camera and front camera, for extra versatility.

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This Apple Watch comes packed with lots of new functionality, including temperature sensing, crash detection and sleep stage monitoring. It’s a huge upgrade over the Series 7 and still contains all the step-counting, calories and workout tracking. In our review of the smartwatch, our reviewer said: “It has a heart-rate monitor so that it can warn you if your heart rate goes unexpectedly high or low, or tell you if you have an irregular heart rhythm, along with notifications of cardio fitness.” 

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It’s only four months old, but Apple’s 15in MacBook Air with the M2 chip has already had a sizeable £150 sliced off its price at Amazon. “Apple’s MacBook Air 15in pulls off a clever trick: it adds significant extra screen size without losing the Air’s signature super-thin and super-light qualities,” our writer said in their review. “Performance is similar to the 13.6in MacBook air, that is, the M2 processor is more than fast enough for most needs, handling all tasks effortlessly and silently.”

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The Apple Watch SE is the budget smartwatch from the tech giant. Released last year, this is the lowest price we’ve ever seen the entry-level SE 2. While lacking some of the best features found on the Series 8, our writer praised its fast processor in their review, saying that its “performance is smooth and responsive”. They added that the “SE 2 also has cardio fitness notifications and, crucially, can let you know if your heart rate is irregular or goes surprisingly high or low, as well as crash detection and fall detection.”

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Black Friday takes place at the same time every year – the first Friday after the US holiday of Thanksgiving. It stretches across the last weekend of November, with the whole shebang concluding on the following Monday, which is dubbed Cyber Monday. This year, Black Friday will officially take place from Friday 24 November through to Monday 27 November. But any seasoned sale aficionado will know Black Friday is now a month-long event, and deals have already started dropping at Very, John Lewis & Partners, Currys and more.

Apple doesn’t really take part in sales such as Black Friday. You won’t find any of its products discounted on the tech giant’s official store. Instead, when you purchase an item, you’ll be able to claim gift cards that can be used at the Apple Store in the future.

On 17 November, Apple announced that its Black Friday Apple Store deals will begin on 24 November and end on 27 November.

If you buy a Mac or Mac Mini, you can get a gift card worth up to £160. If you buy an iPhone 14, 13 or SE, Apple will give you a gift card worth up to £60. An iPad Pro, iPad Air, a 10th generation iPad or an iPad Mini will bag you a gift card worth up to £80, while an Apple Watch Series 9 or Apple Watch SE will secure you up to £40, and the AirPods Pro 2, AirPods 3rd gen and AirPods Max will land you a gift card worth up to £60.

If you want a discount on the Apple product you are just about to buy, instead of a future purchase, you have to turn to third-party retailers.

In the absence of Black Friday deals from the Apple Store itself, you’ll have to turn to retailers such as Amazon, Argos, John Lewis & Partners, Very, AO and more. In the past, these retailers have discounted the price of Apple’s devices by hundreds of pounds during Black Friday. We’ve rounded up a few of the best ones below.

It’s worth turning back the clock and reviewing last year’s Black Friday deals, to figure out which Apple deals we’ll see in 2023.

Last year, the Apple AirPods Pro (£229, Amazon.co.uk) were still a fairly new product, and most retailers discounted them by a modest £20. Now they’re more than a year old, expect even bigger discounts on the flagship wireless earbuds. You’re likely to find the best price at Amazon – the online retailer discounted the AirPods Pro by £40 during Prime Day in July.

Amazon also sliced the price of the 2022 iPad Air (£649, Amazon.co.uk), taking it down to just £569. It also discounted the 10.9in iPad (£484, Amazon.co.uk) by £30. That was a pretty good deal, given the iPad had only just been revealed a few months earlier.

If you were after an Apple Watch, online retailer Very slashed the price of the all-new Apple Watch Ultra (£669, Johnlewis.com) by £30. The smartwatch had only just been announced a couple of months prior. Amazon also cut the price of the Apple Watch Series 7 to its lowest ever price, and we’re expecting savings on the Apple Watch Series 8 this year.

There were plenty of MacBook deals to go around, too. We saw the price of the MacBook Air plummet by £50 (at every retailer) in the Black Friday sale, while the M1 MacBook Air was discounted by more than £100 at Very.

Finally, what about iPhone discounts? Sadly, these were fairly small, and few and far between. We’re hoping for better discounts this time around, given that the iPhone 15 Pro range has just had price cuts across the board here in the UK.

For the latest home appliance discounts and more offers, try the links below:

Here’s your cheat sheet to the next Black Friday 2023 sale, including all the best early deals