This year, Amazon is ramping up the deals with a second two-day sale event ahead of Black Friday — the unofficial start to holiday shopping season. After kicking off yesterday, the Amazon Prime Early Access Sale continues until tonight, with tons of discounted home décor, clothing, skin care, kitchen gadgets, tech, and products for kids and babies. We’re thinking of it as a sort of holiday-shopping amuse bouche, during which you can get a taste of some excellent deals, whether you’re stocking up on necessities or buying gifts ahead of time. As with Prime Day 1.0, there’s a huge amount to sift through and not all of the deals are worth your time, so we’ve gone ahead and picked the best stuff to help you get in and get out.
Here we’re focusing on the best toy discounts, including Strategist favorites like a foldable wooden dollhouse from Melissa & Doug, a cherry-red PlasmaCar, a Beyblade battle stadium, and a National Geographic mega-slime science kit. And we’re giving priority to the best deals from expert-recommended products we’ve written about before, as well as new toys from Strategist-approved kid brands like Lego, Crayola, LOL Surprise, Rainbow High, Hasbro, and Crazy Forts. If you’re looking for toys for kids of a certain age, we’ve split the list up into four categories: babies and toddlers, 4- and 5-year-olds, 6- and 7-year-olds, and 8-year-olds and up.
Read on to see all the deals we found so far and keep checking back as we’ll be updating this article with more and more great toy deal as they surface.
Just remember, sales end tonight at 11:59 p.m. PT (or 2:59 a.m. ET on Thursday), so if you see something you like, we recommend buying it before it’s too late.
For babies and toddlers
An adorable and very cuddly classic stuffed teddy that’s just the right size for carrying everywhere.
Hape toys are some of the most durable and well made on the market, which is part of why they regularly win awards for excellence. This pound and tap bench with accompanying xylophone will delight any toddler and is a good bang for your buck even when it’s not on sale.
Tegu’s set of magnetic wooden blocks comes recommended by the child-development experts we spoke to for our gift guide for 1-year-olds. This travel-themed set can be transformed from a plane to a boat to a rocket ship and much more.
Toddlers love anything that helps them more accurately mimic adult behavior. This sturdy and very realistic shopping cart from Melissa & Doug will keep them busy for long stretches of time while helping them improve their balance and gross motor skills.
CoComelon is a YouTube TV show for preschoolers that has views in the billions and lots of spinoff toys you can buy. This JJ doll, which we included in our story about the holiday toys to buy before they sell out, was so popular last year it sold out several times over. If you didn’t snag one then, here’s your chance to lock it in now.
Green Toys are a Strategist editor and reader favorite. Their line of trucks, tea sets, wagons, and garden tools are durable, adorable, and made from recycled BPA-free plastic. This blue and yellow submarine has a handle and a working back propellor that makes bath time play extra fun.
For 4- and 5-year-olds
Here’s another award-winning Hape toy. The multi-colored dollhouse is constructed from solid wood sourced from environmentally sustainable forests. It has a working door and pulley-system light fixture, comes with furniture and household appliances, and the roof is reversible with greenery on one side and snow on the other for the changing of the seasons.
This all-new 16-GB Amazon Fire 7 children’s tablet delivers learning, entertainment, and games at the touch of a screen. The bundle includes the tablet, a one-year Amazon Kids+ subscription, a kid-proof case with built-in stand, and a two-year guarantee.
You can never, ever have too many Magna-Tiles, especially when they include cute penguins, seals, and polar-bear babies. But if you’re looking for a larger starter set and a deeper discount, this 100-piece set of PicassoTiles (a less expensive and also compatible version of Magna-Tiles) is a very good deal.
Melissa & Doug toys are known for their quality construction, timelessness, and popularity with young kids, and the brand’s foldable wooden dollhouse is no exception. It has working doors and a handle for carrying, and it includes 11 pieces of wooden furniture as well as two dolls.
Crazy Forts! is another toy that helps kids use up some of their boundless energy. The set comes with 69 pieces for constructing a bunch of different structures and includes instructions for making a puppet theater, a Mars space station, a locomotive, and a circus tent.
If you know a kid who dreams of being a mermaid when they grow up, this mermaid Barbie will rock their world. The tail changes colors when you dip her in water.
For 6- and 7-year-olds
This beginner microscope has all the trappings of the ones they use in real laboratories. Its sturdy all-metal frame is portable, and it boasts adjustable magnification settings (120x, 240x, 300x, 480x, 600x, and 1200x magnifications), LED illumination, a convenient carrying case, and an accessories kit with a shrimp hatchery, petri dish, five prepared slides, seven blank slides, seven slide covers, a graduated cylinder, and much more.
These ingenious cardboard connectors and tools, which we wrote about in the Strategist’s Toy Matrix gift guide, lets children build almost anything out of leftover boxes.
Squishmallows are popular because they are very cute and very squishy. And this squish-tastic purple octopus, named Beula, is big enough to use as a throw pillow as well as a new friend.
Kids are crazy for these blind box collections of miniature grocery store items that make excellent stocking stuffers.
A set of Lego dots for creating custom backpack tags you can share and trade with friends.
This Beyblade battle set was featured in our 2021 guide to the hottest holiday toys. Beyblades are basically spinning tops that kids shoot at each other via a zip-cord launcher to see whose top will survive the battle. The set with its central spinning disc adds to the challenge and unpredictability of the game.
And an extra four-pack of elite Beyblades to intensify the fun.
If the above Dots aren’t their thing, maybe they’ll appreciate this Star Wars-themed Microfighter building kit.
For 8-year-olds and up
For kids who like to fidget, slime is a phenomenal gift. This exciting kit comes with four kinds of slime (including a DIY glow-in-the-dark slime lab) and four kinds of putty.
This Melissa & Doug stand-up loom is a perfect present for creative tweens. It comes with four craft projects to choose from and 91 yards of rainbow yarn.
For adults
This 680-piece set gives adult Lego fans a chance to build their own Marvel memorabilia. Once finished, the Avengers: Endgame model stands 12 inches tall complete with all 6 Infinity Stones, a sturdy stand and a descriptive tablet.
This spooky board game was recommended by Taryn Gregory, the inventory lead at Guardian Games. What sets this game apart, she says, is that you play “with an app that has incredible music and voice-overs to run the game for the player.”
A perfect gift for your most competitive, Scrabble-obsessed family member, the Deluxe Edition includes a carrying case, non-slip grid, and a wheeled board that turns for each player.
The Strategist is designed to surface the most useful, expert recommendations for things to buy across the vast e-commerce landscape. Some of our latest conquests include the best acne treatments, rolling luggage, pillows for side sleepers, natural anxiety remedies, and bath towels. We update links when possible, but note that deals can expire and all prices are subject to change.
