Nearly every retailer, big and small, is gearing up for the holiday shopping season. Black Friday is just two weeks away, and it’s time to start thinking about checking off every gift on your list this season for less.
Also: Our favorite early Black Friday deals
But holiday sales have lost their spark, and the discounts don’t feel like those of Christmases past. The truth is, there’s more onus than ever before on shoppers to vet the deals and offers they see during holiday sales. Shady marketing, inflated MSRPs, and other deceptive tactics have infiltrated the online shopping experience and seem to be happening more than ever.
Also: Don’t shop Black Friday until you do these 5 simple things (a shopping editor’s advice)
Thankfully, several free tools are available to help you avoid these pitfalls, and I recommend using them throughout the year to ensure you’re getting the best possible savings. Price tracking is easy, and in most cases, it’s completely free of charge. Combined with other smart moves, such as thorough pre-purchase research, you can be confident in all your online purchases this holiday season.
Generally, most price trackers work the same way. You’ll input a link (such as one from Amazon), and the service can retrieve the price history and present it in an easy-to-read format that may help you decide if the deal is actually a good one.
These are my five favorite price tracking tools that I use as a deals and shopping editor, along with what they’re best for.
Keepa is an Amazon-specific price tracker, and features a great Chrome integration. This allows you to view price history without needing to leave the current Amazon page. This platform also gives a lot of detailed sales data and ways to filter it based on what you’re specifically searching for. I think Keepa is best suited for serious shoppers. It’s my go-to during busy sale events.
CamelCamelCamel is perhaps one of the most recognizable price tools. Like Keepa, it is also designed for Amazon and can track over 5 million products. CamelCamelCamel is best suited for Amazon shopping, and I prefer to use it for one-time price evaluations and comparisons. Therefore, I think it’s perfect for less frequent online shoppers or those who need to compare prices across a limited number of products. This is probably the best bet for most people this holiday season.
However, CamelCamelCamel also has a browser extension, the Camelizer, so it ultimately comes down to preference between using Keepa or CamelCamelCamel. Sometimes I even use both!
AisleGopher works similarly to CamelCamelCamel, but it focuses on Walmart products. Keep in mind that it works best for items specifically sold by Walmart, rather than those sold by third-party sellers. If you’re a heavy Walmart online customer, you’ll find AisleGopher most useful this holiday season.
Visualping is a newer tool for me. It combines some features from other tools on this list, and is most similar to Google’s offerings, in my opinion. It helps track price changes on websites and sends you instant alerts via email or SMS. It’s not just for shopping — it can also be used to monitor a wide range of information online. Similar to more traditional price trackers, you can monitor products you’re eyeing to shop for Black Friday now and create alerts for changes as we get closer the the sales.
Visualping allows you to track changes across any website, not just Amazon or Walmart. It also offers other features, like the ability to monitor the “out of stock” button on a popular product. Visualping will alert you as soon as the button text changes to “add to cart” again. There is a paid tier for this platform, but the free option offers more than enough for most shoppers.
Google offers native price tracking features. There are several ways to access this tool, but the easiest method involves searching for a product via Google Search, then viewing the product card and tapping “Track Price,” followed by accepting notifications. This allows Google to send you push notifications and emails when the price of the particular product you’ve indicated drops. Google’s internal tools are the easiest to navigate and require no other websites or extensions. This makes it perfect for a no-fuss, simple online shopper who prefers all-in-one browsing.
When is Black Friday?
This year in the US, Black Friday is on Nov. 28, 2025, one day after Thanksgiving, which falls on Thursday, Nov. 27.
When is Cyber Monday?
This year in the US, Cyber Monday falls on Dec. 1, 2025, just a few days after Thanksgiving and Black Friday 2025.
Looking for more shopping tips? Check out the 3 money-saving tricks I use every time I shop online – and why you should too. Plus, explore my full Black Friday shopping guide, and find out everything you need to know to save, including sale dates, times, and top offers.
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