By Alan Henry, Lifehacker – November 25, 2012 at 11:00AM
The holiday shopping season is revving up, which means it’s time to search for some bargains so you don’t go broke buying gifts for the people on your list. There are dozens of deal sites out there, but not all of them are useful when it’s time to actually find discounts on things you actually want to buy. We asked you which sites you used, and this week we’re taking a look at the top five, based on your nominations.
Earlier in the week we asked you which deal sites you used to save money. You offered up plenty of options, and we tallied up your votes, but sadly we only have room for the top five.
Slickdeals
Slickdeals is so popular and well known that at my last job, most of my colleagues in our IT group (and out of it, honestly) had Slickdeals as our browser homepages. We never wanted to miss a deal, and new ones were breaking and expiring all day. Slickdeals is largely community powered, with members floating up coupon codes and sales available at retailers all over the web for the community to see and take advantage of, and it’s not just on technology and electronics: apparel, local deals at nearby shops, travel and vacation packages, it’s all there. Or you can hop right to your favorite online retailer and see what they have to offer before you click purchase. The forums are active and lively, and the deals never stop.
Dealnews
The Dealnews network of sites, including DealMac and the old DealRAM and DealCam (which have now been absorbed into Dealnews) offer daily, regularly updating deals from around the web on computer equipment, home electronics, apparel, and much much more. Almost nothing escapes Dealnews’s eye: monitors and displays, TVs and home entertainment gear, headphones and audio equipment, GPS systems, even sunglasses and clothing are all available. The backlog of deals is huge, and you just have to search for the product you’re interested in to see what deals are active in that area and which ones have recently expired. They also get a ton of exclusive deals you’ll only find at Dealnews, and an excellent collection of holiday and Black Friday bargains. I’m pretty sure half my gear I got thanks to Dealnews, and they’re always worth a check for bargains before you start shopping.
Woot!
Woot started off as the original daily deal site, and since being purchased by Amazon back in 2010, has expanded its empire to not just daily technology deals, but deals on wine, kids clothing and toys, technology and home electronics, independently designed t-shirts and apparel, and more. They’ve also launched Deals.Woot, a community powered site full of bargains on virtually any item you can think of, from lingerie to computer components, all upvoted or downvoted by the community so you only see the deals that actually save you money. The other Woot sites also go out of their way to offer more than just one deal a day, with many offering exclusive bargains and super-deep discounts for limited times, most notably their repeated and regular discounts on Gunnar glasses.
Fatwallet
Fatwallet is another deal site that’s been around for a long time, but they’re worth a check before you go shopping online to make sure you’re not missing a coupon code or a retailer that has the item you want on sale. Fatwallet covers major retailers and niche ones, in categories that are largely electronics and computer gear, but also include apparel, cosmetics, jewelry, and local deals in your community. Fatwallet’s biggest resource is its community though: its active forums are full of regularly churning deals that appear, make it big all over the web, and then vanish when the coupon code has been used up or every other deal site on the web links to their forum threads. The site boasts millions of members, and the while the front page is great, the forums are where the magic happens.
BradsDeals
While many deal sites focus on technology deals and electronics discounts, BradsDeals offers up discounts, price alerts, and coupon codes on other items we all buy: clothing, apparel, toiletries and small electronics (shavers, razors, etc), and jewelry. The site has a wealth of coupon codes for popular retailers and big box stores with names you’d recognize, and even offers printable coupons as well so you can run to a brick-and-mortar store when you don’t want to wait for shipping. If you’ve felt that other deal sites are huge electronics stores with tiny household sections and other departments, BradsDeals will fix that for you—think of more like a traditional department store, just only stocked with discounts and coupons you can use anywhere you want to shop.
Now that you’ve seen the top five, it’s time to put them all to a vote to decide the winner.
Honorable mentions this week go out to RetailMeNot, which does host plenty of deals and bargains in addition to the coupon codes for sites around the web that made it famous. If you don’t already check RetailMeNot to see if there’s a coupon for the site you’re shopping on before you click purchase, you really should, even if you wind up being disappointed when there aren’t any. A little love goes out to Passwird, another deal site run by one person, and while it doesn’t have the broadest list of deals, the ones it does have are hand picked and frequently updated. That site hasn’t changed in years, but it’s still worth a bookmark.
Have something to say about one of the contenders? Want to make the case for your personal favorite, even if it wasn’t included in the list? Remember, the top five are based on your most popular nominations from the call for contenders thread from earlier in the week. Make your case for your favorite—or alternative—in the discussions below.
The Hive Five is based on reader nominations. As with most Hive Five posts, if your favorite was left out, it’s not because we hate it—it’s because it didn’t get the nominations required in the call for contenders post to make the top five. We understand it’s a bit of a popularity contest, but if you have a favorite, we want to hear about it. Have a suggestion for the Hive Five? Send us an email at tips+hivefive@lifehacker.com!