With the explosion of online shopping came the advent of Free Shipping Day, the most absurd non-holiday of the year. It's more convenient to shop online, sure, but it's not fun having to calculate shipping fees depending on where you live, or desperately scraping the web for coupon codes.
Picking up on this, many retailers and vendors waive shipping fees during this weekend. It's a last-ditch attempt to lure someone to an otherwise great deal before the holidays are over, especially those of us who haven't become citizens of the Bezos Empire.
December 14-15 is usually the final cutoff to have an item arrive before December 25, acknowledging that shipping companies and their drivers are inundated with deliveries around this time of year. I recommend setting up shipping alerts—try to factor in unsafe weather conditions in certain parts of North America and the rest of the world, which could delay your stuff from hitting your doorstep. Lastly, all of these retailers do Free Shipping Day a little differently—you might need to apply a coupon code at checkout, or maybe free ground shipping is pre-waived. Read the instructions on the site to get your discount.
Pre-built PCs are insanely expensive to ship because they're big, heavy, and fragile—if you're ordering one, you can take advantage of one of these offers to potentially save $100+ on shipping.
Newegg
Newegg has a bunch of discounted items that are also eligible for free shipping at the moment under its "Santa's Secret Stash" promotion. Not everything is eligible (they won't, as it turns out, ship a $700 NAS for free), but look for the "free shipping" label in the upper-right corner of many of these items on the product pages themselves.
As for the deals themselves, you can grab this 27-inch curved Acer monitor with a 144Hz refresh rate for $200, $80 off the asking price, or 32GB (2 x 16GB) of Corsair Vengeance DDR4 3000 RAM for $137. The best ones are highlighted in the separated sections as you scroll down the page, but if you want to see all the deals, head straight to the bottom and click on the art for graphics cards, RAM, SSDs, and processors to find the free shipping deals on those items. You can save big on a couple 2nd-gen Ryzen CPUs, up to 40 percent off. There's a Ryzen 7 2700X for $194.99, plus you can get either Borderlands 3 or The Outer Worlds for PC free with your purchase. However, there's not a lot of deals on graphics cards, as their offerings seem even skimpier than they were over Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
These deals expire at 11:59PM PT on December 19 unless specified below or on the product page.
Free shipping applies to the following locations/methods:
- APO/FPO-Military ONLY
- FedEx International Economy-PR ONLY
- Super Eggsaver (4-7 Business Days)
- Newegg 3 Business Days
- Newegg 2 Business Days
- Newegg Next Business Day
- UPS Ground
- Large Item Delivery - Front Door (Adult Signature Required)
- Large Item Delivery - White Glove (Adult Signature Required)
Unfortunately, free shipping is restricted to the contiguous United States, and extra fees may apply to anyone who lives in Alaska, Hawaii, or Puerto Rico.
CyberPowerPC
CyberPower has two different shipping specials happening right now. The first the free shipping on all laptops and selected desktop PCs in the US, and the second is free two-day shipping on all Instant Ship desktops—with an extra $300 off. You'll be able to easily tell what systems have the free shipping applied by the tag in the upper left hand corner of the product image. If you want to receive your new laptop or desktop by the 25th, you must place your order no later than the 17th.
iBuyPower
If you purchase an RDY gaming desktop PC from iBuyPower, you'll receive two-day shipping for free. Also, since the company is offering this on its same-day systems, if you place your order by 1:00 PM PST, your rig will ship out on the same day.
We've reviewed a few iBuyPower pre-built systems recently, and were impressed. Of course, with an ISB (integrated system builder) like this one, how much you spend is up to you. But at least you now you'll save on speedy shipping.
Lenovo
Lenovo does things a little different. Instead of offering free shipping during a smart part of the year, it offers free standard shipping and free returns on nearly all products year-round. Ineligible items will not have "free shipping" in green text when you put them in your shopping cart.
Be aware, however, that it could be weeks before your laptop ships, especially if you are fully customizing it. So, while it won't arrive until after the holidays, at least you're still saving some money.
Maingear
This boutique system builder has a ton of holiday sales running until December 27. But not just that—if you purchase something directly from their site between now and then, you can use coupon code freeshipforma to waive the ground shipping cost.
Considering desktop PCs and gaming chairs are those higher-ticket items that drive up shipping costs, you can save a ton of cash by taking advantage of this, and spend that money elsewhere like a ticket to Disneyland or a single new tire for your car.
Microsoft
The Microsoft Store is currently offering free 2-3 day shipping when you buy online on select holiday deals. You also get free returns if you buy online, too. There's a lot to pick from: laptops, VR headsets, PCs, controllers, and games. This free 2-3 day shipping will only last as long as the deals, so don't expect it to stick around after the holidays.
NZXT
As usual, NZXT is having another holiday sale that runs between now and December 27. It's already discounted a bunch of PC cases, motherboard covers, chairs, and everything in-between. For orders under $119, ground shipping costs $9.99, but if you have your heart set on something like the new H510 case, which is on sale, ground shipping is waived as long as your order is over $119.
Walmart
If you haven't already known about Walmart's free two-day shipping program, now you do. Spend $35 or more in a single order and your two-day shipping fees are waived. It's been around for nearly three years and, unlike Amazon, you don't need a membership to take advantage of it. And you can put together a new battle station all in one place and pay $0 in shipping fees.
There are a few caveats to this, however: The item must be marked as "2-Day delivery," like how Amazon marks products that are Prime-eligible. If all the items in your cart are not two-day eligible, then you're going to pay for shipping. Also, this offer is only available in the contiguous United States, so residents of Alaska and Hawaii are out of luck.
But if you do live in one of the 48 contiguous states, Walmart has plenty to pick from for PC gamers. This perfect entry-level Lenovo gaming laptop with a last-gen GTX 1050 is just $589, or maybe a more powerful MSI GL65 is what you're looking for. There's enough laptops, desktops, mice, headsets, keyboards, and monitors to go around, and the deals range from decent to great. Don't be fooled by the discount on this Razer Mamba, though. While $50 is a nice price for this wireless gaming mouse, the list price over Black Friday and Cyber Monday was $80, not $100.
