Prime Big Deal Days 2026: Dates, Start Time and How It Works
Amazon's Prime Big Deal Days 2026, the October Prime Day, runs October 6-7 in 22 countries. In the US it opens at 12:01 a.m. PT on Tuesday, October 6 (3:01 a.m. ET) and closes at 11:59 p.m. PT on October 7; in the UK it starts at 12:01 a.m. BST. It is Prime-only, with new deal drops three times a day, and follows a summer Prime Day that moved to June 23-26 this year. Sources: About Amazon, Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, NBC News.
The context
Prime Big Deal Days 2026 runs on Tuesday, October 6 and Wednesday, October 7. It is Amazon’s October sale, widely called October Prime Day, and it lasts 48 hours. In the United States it opens at 12:01 a.m. Pacific on October 6, which is 3:01 a.m. on the East Coast, and closes at 11:59 p.m. Pacific on October 7. In the United Kingdom it opens at 12:01 a.m. BST the same day. Amazon frames it as the kickoff of the holiday shopping season, with deals across more than 35 categories.
The event is reserved for Prime members in 22 countries, including the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Japan, Mexico and Brazil. Local sites use their own names: Jours Flash Prime in France, Prime Deal Days in Germany and Fiesta Prime in Spain, all on the same October 6-7 dates. In the US, Prime costs $14.99 a month or $139 a year, and new members can shop the event inside a 30-day free trial. Two cheaper routes exist: Prime for Young Adults at $7.49 a month after a six-month $0 trial, and Prime Access at $6.99 a month for households on qualifying assistance.
The mechanics matter more than the headline. Amazon opened early deals ahead of the event, starting with its own devices, Kindle, Amazon Haul and Amazon Music. During the 48 hours, Today’s Big Deals drop three times a day, at midnight, 8 a.m. and 1 p.m. Pacific, and they run only while stock lasts. New this year is a push on Alexa for Shopping, which can send price alerts, buy an item automatically at a target price and show up to a year of price history.
The calendar also shifted this year. The summer Prime Day left July for June 23-26, 2026, a four-day event, which leaves a longer gap before the October sale. Prime Big Deal Days itself has been running since 2022, when it launched as the Prime Early Access Sale. The editions since then fell on October 10-11 (2023), October 8-9 (2024) and October 7-8 (2025).
For a buyer, the useful comparison is with the rest of the season. Black Friday falls on November 27, 2026, and Cyber Monday on November 30, and those cover every retailer, not just Amazon, with no membership needed. The October event is strongest on Amazon’s own hardware and on brands that sign up for it. The sensible approach is to check an item’s real price history before October 6, buy if the event price is truly below it, and use the October number as the benchmark for late November. Sources: About Amazon, About Amazon UK, About Amazon EU, Amazon.com, NBC News.