LAST CALL for Amazon Christmas Delivery (YMMV)

Amazon’s sprawling infrastructure gives them more flexibility for last minute Christmas deliveries, but because of the nature of this sprawl, there is not a single deadline for all shoppers like B&H Photo and Adorama. How late you can place a pre-Christmas Amazon order depends on many factors including:

  • your location
  • which products you want to buy
  • the physical location of the products you want to buy (eg are they available locally/nearby?)
  • if you are a Prime member (or willing to pay more for 1-day delivery)

Based on the above factors, and according to the Amazon Holiday Delivery page, the range varies wildly, from “already too late” to Sunday up to 9:30am local time (best case scenario) for regular Amazon deliveries. Or you can go as late as Sunday at 9:14pm local time (best case scenario) with Prime NOW (Prime members only). Prime NOW has a smaller subset of the regular Amazon inventory.

You can get a better estimate by going to the product page of the items of interest, add to cart, and check the options and estimates for delivery. Let’s use two popular tech items for example. The Amazon product page tells me that the all new 7″ Kindle Oasis can arrive here before Christmas, while the Apple Beats Solo 3 will arrive after Christmas. On the other hand, if you live near an Amazon warehouse that has the Beats Solo 3 in-stock, then you will be able to get them before Christmas. And vice versa on the Kindle Oasis.

STRATEGY SESSION
If you don’t need to receive the items by Monday, there are two good reasons to wait until late Monday or Tuesday to place an order:

1) you may get Amazon gift cards as gifts, so you can use those to pay for your next purchase

2) it reduces the stress/load on the delivery drivers who are scrambling for last minute deliveries.