I never buy from Amazon before checking these two websites

It’s time for you to stop assuming Amazon is the fastest and least expensive way to buy everything, even if you pay for Amazon Prime. Before the pandemic, Amazon was almost always the cheapest and fastest way to buy things, but since COVID, things are different. There are two sites I always check before buying anything on Amazon, and you should too.

#1 CamelCamelCamel

Check price history before you buy anything

Prices on Amazon fluctuate for a variety of reasons, like seasonality, product release cycles, competition, economic factors, and more. From my observation, most price fluctuations relate to the time of year. I use CamelCamelCamel.com to look at the price history of items I’m buying on Amazon to determine the best time to buy, especially if it’s a big purchase that can wait. For example, if you’re buying patio furniture, the best time of year to buy is typically in the fall, when most people are hunkering down for winter and not thinking about buying outdoor furniture, and manufacturers try to juice sales by discounting. Conversely, the worst time to buy patio furniture would be towards the end of winter or early spring when demand is highest.

Credit: Brandon Miniman / MakeUseOf

Also, I’ve noticed that prices tend to fluctuate between a “regular” and a “discount” price almost in a binary fashion. If I used CamelCamelCamel to see that a pizza oven I want to buy is usually $299.95, but often gets discounted to $199.95, like as in the case for this Ninja Artisan Pizza Oven, I’m likely to adjust my purchasing time based on when the price hits that lower threshold, and as I’ll describe in a bit, you can even use CamelCamelCamel’s free email alert system to be notified when the price gets to that lower boundary.

How to get emailed when your desired price is reached

Credit: Brandon Miniman / MakeUseOf

Another fantastic feature of CamelCamelCamel is price alerts for finding out exactly when a product hits its lower threshold. To do this, just hit “Add Amazon Price Watch” on any product page. Enter your desired price and your email, and you’ll be notified as soon as the target price is reached, so you don’t have to check the site.

#2 Walmart.com

Hear me out on this one

Since COVID, Walmart (like Amazon) has built its own massive delivery network, which means that in a lot of cases, Walmart deliveries show up at your door next-day, or in some cases, same-day, in just hours after you hit the Buy button, especially since Walmart can leverage its 10,800 stores as distribution centers to quickly get you your order. And in the case of many product categories, especially grocery and household essentials, Walmart.com is actually cheaper. That’s right, and let me repeat this for emphasis: in a lot of cases, Walmart.com is now both cheaper and faster than Amazon.com.

If you don’t subscribe to Walmart+ (it’s a $98 annual fee) or if you’re not making a purchase over $35, Walmart may charge a small delivery fee. But if you live within range of one of almost 11,000 Walmart retail locations, you can buy online and pick up in store and save the delivery fee. I found that even after the delivery fee, buying from Walmart is still faster and cheaper than Amazon, especially for groceries and home essentials.

Another recent change to Walmart.com, which has contributed to lower prices, is the expansion of third-party selling, which Amazon has had for many years. The fact that Walmart.com now allows external sellers to sell on the website means more competition and lower prices for you. Not only that, but Walmart now has Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS), which is similar to Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA). Both WFS and FBA allow third parties to easily keep their inventory warehoused with Amazon or Walmart, which has greatly expanded the availability of merchandise and has resulted in downward pressure on prices.

As another contributor to Walmart’s fast delivery, in 2025, Walmart introduced “dark stores,” which look like regular Walmart stores but are closed to the public and dedicated entirely to online order fulfillment. Not many retailers, including Amazon, have the logistics, distribution, and retail footprint like Walmart to enable super-fast delivery of almost anything to almost anywhere.

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If you’re still using Amazon for everything, you’re missing out

Again, before the pandemic, you could close your eyes, buy from Amazon, and assume you were getting the lowest price and fastest shipping on everything. But Covid forced all retailers to up their digital game, which, in the case of Walmart, included the rapid and extensive build-out of its own delivery network, meaning that in many cases, Walmart is faster and cheaper than Amazon.