Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days runs October 6 and 7 this year, three weeks from today. Going into it, the best-selling projectors on Amazon are more expensive than they were before Labor Day. We re-checked the live price of every machine in the category’s top 24 this morning: the median is now $67.99. On August 24, two weeks before the holiday weekend, it was $59.98.
When we looked at the run-up to Labor Day, we said the median was the number to watch, and that it would have to fall in early September for the holiday to count as a real event in this category. It did not fall. It rose by eight dollars.
Most of the rise is new arrivals, not markups
An eight-dollar jump in the median sounds like across-the-board price increases, and that is not quite what happened. Six of today’s 24 were not on the list on August 24: an Epson EpiqVision Flex CO-FH02 at $449.99, an HP-branded portable at $125, a Magcubic 1080p model at $109.99, the Aurzen Roku TV E1R at $89.99, and two unbranded minis at $39.99 each. Those six have a median of $99.99, and three of them sit above $100. The list has shifted upward because more expensive machines climbed into it.
The 18 machines that were on the list both then and now tell the cleaner story. Their median moved from $55.57 to $59.99. Measured one by one, eight of the 18 got at least one percent more expensive, nine did not move, and exactly one got cheaper. Before Labor Day the same count was nine up and seven down. The markdowns have mostly stopped; the increases have not.
The individual moves
The biggest same-machine increase is an unbranded mini projector (ASIN B0GGH9DJ9Q) that sat at $59.98 or $59.99 on every reading from July 28 to September 1, then showed $89.99 by September 9 and still does. That is a 50 percent increase in a single week, and it cost the listing its position: it ranked sixth on September 1 and is 22nd now.
The number-one seller (B0F7RR3YC6) shows how noisy this gets at the top. It was $69.98 on July 28, $75.99 through most of August, $73.99 around Labor Day, $83.99 on September 9, and $75.99 again this morning. It stayed at or near the top of the ranking through all of it, with a rating count now past 4,280. Buyers at this price are not especially sensitive to eight-dollar swings, and the seller appears to know that.
The Magcubic model with Wi-Fi 6 (B0DYMNJKSQ) went from $54.14 to $59.99, up 10.8 percent. An AKIYO mini went from $41.92 to $43.99, and a Wi-Fi 6 wireless unit from $29.98 to $31.98. None of these are dramatic, but they all point the same way.
The ONOAYO 4K outdoor projector (B0FB3P6H48) is the machine to be most careful with. It has flipped between two prices all summer: $257.99 on July 28, $402.99 on August 1, $241.99 on August 8 and 9, $402.99 again when we checked it on August 21 and 25, $241.99 on September 5 and 12, and $402.99 this morning. A “deal” in October that takes it to $241.99 would be a price it has already sold for on at least four days we happened to look.
The one real cut among continuing machines is modest: a mini projector (B0FGJ478M8) at $43.19, down from $47.99. The largest cut we have logged since Labor Day belongs to a newcomer. The Aurzen Roku TV E1R entered the list on September 2 at $139.99 and was $89.99 a week later, where it has stayed.
The prices that did not move
Nine of the 18 held still, and several have not moved at all since late July. The HAPPRUN 1080p outdoor projector has been $84.92 or $84.93 on every reading, while its rating count passed 13,850. The Aurzen Roku TV D1R air is at $149.97, one cent off the $149.99 it has carried all summer. The NexiGo PJ40 Pro is still $299.99, and an unbranded 4K-support mini (B0DSKXRMWT) has read $34.19 every time since July.
Outside the best-seller list, the Dangbei N3 Max is also still at $399.99, the price we recorded in late August after it came down from the $559.99 it carried in early August. That is three weeks at the same number for a projector with 1,000 ISO lumens from a sealed optical engine, VIDAA with officially licensed Netflix, and automatic focus and keystone correction. A price that holds through a holiday weekend is the most useful baseline a shopper can have going into October, because any Prime Day figure below it will be a genuine reduction.
What to write down before October 6
A percentage badge tells you the size of a cut against some earlier price. It does not tell you what the machine actually sold for last month, and on this list that is the number that matters. These are the prices we have on record for the machines most likely to show up in Prime Day promotions, set against what they cost this morning:
| Projector (ASIN) | Late July / August | September 16 |
|---|---|---|
| Mini projector, #1 seller (B0F7RR3YC6) | $69.98 to $75.99 | $75.99 |
| Mini projector (B0GGH9DJ9Q) | $59.99 | $89.99 |
| Magcubic Wi-Fi 6 mini (B0DYMNJKSQ) | $54.14 to $65.89 | $59.99 |
| Magcubic HY300 Pro (B0F53F8DB3) | $37.77 to $49.99 | $41.99 |
| HAPPRUN 1080p outdoor (B0B28G5Y4R) | $84.93 | $84.92 |
| TMY 1080p mini (B082F13J55) | $69.98 to $89.99 | $79.99 |
| Aurzen Roku TV D1R (B0FKMHPCCB) | $129.98 to $139.99 | $139.99 |
| Aurzen Roku TV D1R air (B0GSQKP7RF) | $149.99 | $149.97 |
| ONOAYO 4K outdoor (B0FB3P6H48) | $241.99 to $402.99 | $402.99 |
| NexiGo PJ40 Pro (B0FFP3RG53) | $299.99 | $299.99 |
Where a machine shows a range, the low end is the one to hold a deal against. A Prime Day price on the B0GGH9DJ9Q mini that lands at $64.99 would carry a big percentage badge next to today’s $89.99 and still be five dollars above what it sold for all of August.
For shoppers who want a price already checked against live listings rather than a badge, our under-$100 guide and under-$500 guide both carry the date each figure was verified. We will re-run the full top 24 in the first days of October, and again on October 6, and report whether the median finally moves the other way.
