The best media streaming device connects you with the video and audio content you want in the fastest, most helpful way. We’ve recommended Roku devices since 2012, but now Roku’s reign has come to an end. The Google Chromecast with Google TV is our new favorite thanks to a redesigned interface that better reflects how people watch video in 2021, and it feels completely modern compared with the competition.
Google’s Nest Audio and Nest Mini use voice commands to retrieve news, music, entertainment, and quick answers to easy questions, and especially to control lights and appliances throughout the house. With its context-aware search capabilities, ever-growing Actions library, ability to synchronize with multiple Google accounts, and wide support for various smart-home devices, the Google Home brings voice-controlled convenience to (almost) every corner of your life.
For a few bucks, a good USB car charger can charge your phone and other devices faster than the port that came in your car. After testing more than 60 models, we’ve determined that the best car charger is the dual-port Nekteck PD 45W Type-C Car Charger. You can fast-charge phones, tablets, and laptops on its USB-C port and simultaneously charge a second phone on its USB-A port. No other charger offers as much power for a better price.
Whether you’re celebrating your granddad, your dad, or your favorite “zaddy,” you may need some gifting inspiration. Sure, Dad may insist—firmly—that he “doesn’t want anything,” but we all know that doesn’t mean you can skip the holiday. Even if you can’t pry it out of him, you can still get him something he’ll appreciate. Send him one of these great, Wirecutter-recommended gifts for dads—none of which is another boring tie.
Dental cavities are the most common chronic disease of childhood, and one in five kids will develop a cavity by around the time they enter kindergarten. Though an electric toothbrush isn’t guaranteed to eliminate dental issues, experts say an electric brush can make it easier for some kids to achieve good brushing habits. After 16 hours of research and testing, we think the Quip Kids Electric Toothbrush is an effective, kid-friendly choice.
There was once a time when buying a new laptop charger was difficult and expensive, but computers with USB-C charging have made replacements easier to get and more affordable than ever. The best choice for almost any modern tablet or laptop is Nekteck’s 60W USB-C GaN Charger. This adapter is just as powerful and reliable as a replacement from your laptop’s manufacturer, and it’s smaller than almost any other we’ve seen. It’s safety-tested and certified, and it comes with its own USB-C charging cable, making it a particularly great value at its very low price.
A warm but lightweight blanket can be the key to a cozy fireside cuddle or surviving the sidelines of a Little League game. After spending 40 hours researching and testing 13 puffy blankets outdoors, analyzing them with an outdoor insulation guru in his workshop, crashing a series of outdoor movie nights, and stress testing at a local laundromat, we think the Rumpl Down Puffy is best for keeping you cozy.
Most grandparents are happiest with the gift of your presence—but a little something special would be welcome, too. Whether your grandparent is a nature lover or a homebody, a cinephile or a cook, we’ve scoured our guides and polled our colleagues to find the very best things to dazzle them.
If massage chairs are a symbol of comfort and even indulgence, shopping for one can be stressful. There are numerous models to choose from—many of which merely vibrate, rather than knead, or tout pseudoscientific and inscrutable features like “air ionization” and “chromotherapy.” After testing 12 models from some of the top brands, we think the Osaki OS-Champ is almost as good as a real massage. This chair is comfortable to sit in and sturdily built, and it massages the entire body. Plus, it outperformed more-expensive massage chairs in key areas like heating and reclining.
There’s technically no winner at a white elephant gift exchange, but the most successful Dirty Santa soiree sees everyone leaving with a fun holiday gift that’s not only entertaining but also, ideally, useful. (The environmental impact of a totally useless gift surely outweighs the charm of the gag.) For this guide, we asked Wirecutter staffers to recommend the most hilarious, Yankee-Swap-worthy gifts under $25 that made them smile. We think they’ll make you smile too.
A monitor that’s positioned too high or too low—or too close or too far from you—is a recipe for neck and shoulder pain. Unlike the stand that comes with most monitors, a monitor arm provides flexibility to position your screen exactly where you want it for proper ergonomics and comfort. It can also free up space on your desk and help your workspace look neater. After assessing 10 monitor arms ranging in price from $50 to $335 in a new round of testing, we found that the Fully Jarvis Monitor Arm is the best option. It moves smoothly into a wide range of positions and angles, holds monitors up to 32 inches in size steadily and securely, and is easy to set up. It’s also backed by the longest warranty we’ve seen for monitor arms.
If you’re trying to get as close as possible to re-creating a genuine movie-theater experience at home, there's just no replacement for a good AV receiver. Think of it as the traffic cop of your audio-video system, routing video from your sources to your display and sending audio to your speakers. Some AV receivers do much more than that—for a price. Which AV receiver is right for you depends on your needs, so we offer multiple recommendations for different situations.
You’re never too old to feel the excitement of a bulging stocking come Christmas morning, but we think most adults would also appreciate these under $40 gifts in a nicely wrapped box. From the whimsical to the practical, these gifts will charm anyone on your list. If you’re looking for even more great, affordable stocking stuffer ideas, see our guides to the best gifts under $25 and the best gifts under $50.
The avalanche of early Black Friday promotions has begun, and we’re sifting through the duds to find the best deals worth your time. We’ve already seen notable sales from Best Buy and Amazon, and now Costco, Target, and Walmart are throwing their hats into the ring. Black Friday doesn’t officially begin until November 26, but these early sales may be your best bet for avoiding frustrating stock and shipping issues from 2021’s ongoing product shortages and supply-chain disruptions. We’ll continue to scour all of the sales and update this list—as well as the Wirecutter Deals page—with the best early deals we find.
After a long day, crawling into a bed that’s outfitted with fresh sheets and a comfortable blanket is one of life’s greatest pleasures. A good blanket is warm, but a great blanket is also breathable, soft, and stylish, and should last for years and years. We’ve spent 500-plus hours testing 44 blankets for every season, and we’ve found seven that should make you thrilled to go to bed.
Birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries have a nasty tendency to creep up on you unexpectedly, always at the most harried minute. And as if shopping on a deadline weren’t stressful enough, the current moment looks to be even more challenging, with global shipping delays and shortages. But fear not! We’ve gathered a wide array of pleasing and practical gifts—with reliable stock—that you can have delivered to your loved one’s doorstep in under two days, pick up curbside in minutes, or send to their inbox in seconds.
If you find an automated two-minute timer helpful or simply prefer the feeling of brushing with a powered assist, you may find upgrading to an electric toothbrush worthwhile. After more than 100 total hours of research, interviewing experts, evaluating nearly every model available, and testing 36 toothbrushes ourselves in hundreds of trials at the bathroom sink, we’ve found that the Oral-B Pro 1000 is the best electric toothbrush for most people. It has the fewest fancy features of the models we tested, but it does have the most important things experts recommend—a built-in two-minute timer and access to one of the most extensive and affordable lines of replaceable toothbrush heads available—for the lowest price.
One of the best things about having a turntable is the massive selection of used—and often cheap—records out there. Building a collection is easy, but those records often come in less-than-ideal condition. Cleaning your records, both new additions and old ones, improves their sound quality and reduces the wear and tear on your stylus, so it won’t need to be replaced as often.
Housewarming gifts have a well-earned reputation for ending up in the recycling bin or donation pile. And that’s a shame, because a thoughtfully chosen housewarming gift can help a new house become a home. Our surefire formula for success: Choose a gift informed by what you already knew about your recipient before they received the keys to their new home, while also imagining what new stories might unfold at their new address.
Lap desks are like the athleisure of workspaces: not the most elegant option but generally comfortable and functional. After spending 15 hours researching and 32 hours testing lap desks, we’re confident that the LapGear Designer is the best for most people. It reigns supreme in terms of comfort and build quality, has one of the widest and sturdiest surfaces of any lap desk we tested, and offers extra storage options for your phone and other supplies.
Online sales are everywhere. They can take the form of targeted emails promising giant discounts, or holiday or anniversary sale “extravaganzas” touted with exciting but mostly meaningless language like “Our biggest event of the year!” It’s often quite difficult to know whether an offering is an overhyped “sale” that doesn’t provide a meaningful discount or an actual deal. Typical “sale” promotions are awash in marketing language and inflated “full” prices, and they’re often saddled with a healthy list of exclusions or conditions. But an actual deal is a real and meaningful discount off the typical price of an item.
People may take light switches for granted because they’re, well, pretty boring. (Not to us, though!) Smart switches, however, add a little pizzazz and convenience, letting you control your entire house’s lighting with an app or voice command whether you’re at the office, on vacation, or in bed for the night. We recommend the TP-Link Kasa Smart Wi-Fi Light Switch Dimmer HS220 because it’s easy to use, affordable enough for you to install several throughout a home, and designed to support Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and IFTTT.
A new generation of video game consoles has been out for more than a year, though stock shortages continue. The Xbox One is no more, replaced by a pair of new Xbox consoles. The $500 Xbox Series X and the $300 Xbox Series S are both based on a similar foundation, and both will play all of the same games for years to come. But each model targets a different level of speed and graphics performance, and with that in mind, we’re here to help you figure out which one you should buy—or, if you need to buy one at all.
Get the Series X if you’ll use it with a 4K TV (now, or eventually), want the absolute best in graphics like raytraced lighting effects, or if you want a disc drive for games and movies.
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*At the time of publishing, the price was $500.
With better graphics, more storage, and a disc drive, the Xbox Series X is worth the higher price in many cases. If you have a 4K TV—especially a model with high end features like 120hz and variable refresh rate—or will buy one in the next few years, you’ll likely come across games that can take advantage of the extra graphics capability on the Series X over the Xbox Series S. And although both consoles have impressively fast storage that improves boot-up and load times, the Series X drive has over 800 GB available internally, nearly twice the available storage space in the Series S. Plus, if you have a collection of physical Xbox One, Xbox 360, or original-Xbox games that you want to keep playing, only the Series X has a disc drive, which also makes it the model of choice if you want a console that can also be your 4K Blu-ray player.
Games on the Series S are less likely to take advantage of TVs with 4K resolution, and it lacks a disc drive, a downside if you own a lot of physical games or movies, or like to buy them used. But it's smaller, lighter, can play the new generations of games, and is a great value paired with a Game Pass Ultimate subscription.
On the other hand, if you don’t have a 4K TV (and won’t buy one soon), if space in your entertainment center is a concern, or if you don’t have or plan to buy many physical discs, the Xbox Series S offers a lot of value and still gives you the chance to play the new generation of games to come. And anyone who mostly plays games from Xbox Game Pass—the monthly subscription service with access to hundreds of games, including new releases—probably won’t miss the disc drive. We also think that makes the Xbox Series S an especially budget-conscious choice for younger kids, since the less expensive console and monthly membership add up to more games than a kid can play, with no need to buy new ones all the time. The Series S might also be a good option for some travelers and hosts. If you’re going somewhere for an extended stay, it can easily fit in a carry-on piece of luggage. And if you have a guest room or vacation rental, a Series S adds a lot beyond a regular media streaming box.
If the only reason you’d buy a new console is for brand-new games you can’t play on your existing Xbox One (or, for that matter, a PlayStation 4), you may not need to rush into a new console just yet—most high profile titles this year are still receiving versions on older consoles. But if you spend a lot of time with your Xbox One now and are ready for plenty of immediately noticeable quality of life improvements and conveniences, as well as performance and visual improvements in the games you already have, an Xbox Series X or Series S will provide plenty of immediate benefits.
We also have answers to the most frequently asked questions below.
Light bulbs—even smart ones—should be easy. Just screw a smart LED bulb into a lamp and pair it with a smartphone, and you never have to worry about navigating dark hallways or hunting for a switch. Many even let you adjust the color. We recommend the Philips Wiz Smart Wi-Fi LED Color Bulb because it’s bright enough for everyday use, delivers vibrant colors, and can team up with Amazon Alexa, Apple’s Siri Shortcuts, Google Assistant, and Samsung SmartThings. It’s also one of the most affordable color bulbs we’ve tested, making the switch to using smart bulbs as easy as, well, screwing in a light bulb.
Early Black Friday sales have already launched. Although holiday discounts arrive earlier and earlier each year, we continue to find that only a small portion of these sales are worth your time.
The iPhone 13 lineup is here, and accompanying it is a whole new batch of cases to protect and personalize the updated designs—old iPhone 12 cases won’t fit the 2021 models. If you’re getting one of the new phones, here’s a look at our favorite cases of the initial 60 we tried. We’ll continue to test and update this guide as more cases become available in the coming weeks.
If you don’t want to give your kid an adult smartphone but do want them to have a way to communicate as they become more independent, you have options. Along with our own tween-agers, we tested 13 smartwatches, kid-focused smartphones, flip phones, and other communication devices designed for kids. Although we found that all of these devices make some trade-offs, we have a few to recommend.
After making and tasting over 100 espressos, lungos, latte macchiatos, and cappuccinos, we’ve determined that all Nespresso machines make identical drinks. We don’t love the flavor of Nespresso, but for those who prefer espresso drinks to drip coffee, a Nespresso machine is the fastest and most convenient way to make something like them at home—though if you want to make real at-home espresso, we recommend these beginner setups instead. We like the compact Nespresso Essenza Mini because it makes the same quality coffee as machines that cost hundreds more, without any extra frills.
