Save hundreds by buying refurbished

If you’ve read any of Mashable’s laptop reviews, you know that some of the more jacked-up notebooks from the Lenovo ThinkPad, Apple MacBook, and Huawei MateBook series can do almost everything a desktop computer can do without sacrificing portability.

But spending upwards of $1,000 on a laptop? In this economy?

(Couldn’t be us — at least, not until our tax refunds hit.)

We’ll let you in on a little secret: You can easily save a ton of money on a laptop by forgoing “brand new” in favor of “new to you” — that is, by buying a pre-owned device that’s been inspected, fixed up, and certified to work just as well as it did right out of the box. Whenever we see a retailer selling one of these so-called “refurbished” devices, it’s typically hundreds of dollars cheaper than those in mint condition (with little to no difference in either functionality or cosmetics) — plus, they tend to get much better discounts when they go on sale.

Amazon’s current Deal of the Day is a prime example of just how much you can save if you buy pre-owned tech: Now ’til midnight tonight, the online retailer is selling refurbished variations of Apple’s 2018 MacBook Air for up to 25% less than usual. (Have you ever seen a brand new MacBook Air get a discount that high? No? That’s what we thought.)

In case you missed our official review when it first came out, the 2018 MacBook Air is a good machine for everyday computing tasks, what with its purdy Retina display, adequate Intel Core i5 processor, dual USB-C ports, “Hey Siri” functionality, and built-in headphone jack. (Yep, Apple was still putting those puppies on its devices two years ago. Simpler times.) Some shoppers might be put off by the fact that it sports a butterfly keyboard, but don’t worry — it’s the third-gen version. While not as great as the scissor keyboards on Apple’s new MacBook Pros, it doesn’t suck nearly as much as the second-gen butterfly keyboard. (*shudders*)

Funnily enough, former Mashable tech editor Pete Pachal’s biggest criticism of the 2018 MacBook Air was that at a base price of $1,199, it was far too expensive for a sleek little laptop that’s best-suited for things like word processing, web browsing, and streaming music. Not so much anymore: If you place your order before the clock strikes 12 tonight, you can get a refurbished one from Amazon for as little as $749.49.

As part of Amazon’s sale, you can pick from a storage capacity of either 128GB or 256GB and choose from three different finishes: gold, silver, or space gray. Hit the blue “See Details” button below to start shopping. ⬇️