MacRumors

Note: Black Friday sales continue through the weekend for most retailers. Apple's sales have ended. Most app and software sales below will last until Monday. We've updated our chart below as of Nov 26, 2:30AM Eastern.

Sales Tax

National retailers such as Apple and Best Buy charge local sales tax on all orders. So, the advantage of using other online-only retailers is not getting charged that sales tax at the time of order (though you are typically expected to report it later). Local sales taxes are automatically charged for the following retailers in the following states:

- Apple, Best Buy: All States
- MacMall: California, Illinois, New York, Tennessee, Minnesota, Georgia, North Carolina, Wisconsin
- Amazon: California, New York, Texas, Pennsylvania, Kansas, Kentucky, North Dakota, Washington

If you are in one of those states, it may make sense to look elsewhere or simply buy locally anyway if the savings are comparable.

Discounts on Apple Products

Apple offered their own modest discounts on specific Apple products. Here is a chart of the most competitive 3rd party Apple retailers:

iPhone 5 / 5th Gen iPod Touch

AT&T has started offering a refurbished iPhone 5 (with contract) on their online store. Prices are $100 lower than new:

- 16GB Black iPhone 5 - $99
- 32GB Black iPhone 5 - $199
- 64GB Black iPhone 5 - $299
- 16GB White iPhone 5 - $99
- 32GB White iPhone 5 - $199
- 64GB White iPhone 5 - $299

- 5th Generation iPod Touch with Free $50 Best Buy Gift Card

Software Discounts

iOS and Mac App discounts are ongoing and can be seen in real time at AppShopper.com. We'd previously compiled a large list of the more interesting ones:

- Long list of iOS and Mac Software discounts
- MacUtility Bundle ($59.99) - Parallels Desktop 8, Snagit, VirusBarrier X6, MacOptimizer, Rubbertnet ($245 Value)
- MacLegion Bundle - ($49.99)- TechTool Pro, Freeway Pro, djay, Capo, Fantastical, RipIt, iRip, Beamer, Copy Paste Pro, Code Collector Pro ($548.80 Value)
- iStack Mac Bundle 2.0 ($49.99) - Camtasia 2, Circus Ponies NoteBook, CrossOver XI, FX Photo Studio Pro, LittleSnapper, Printopia, xTeam, MoneyBag, Habits, SyncMate Expert, Build iPhone & iPad Games Without Programming.
- MacGameStore - Up to 80% Off on Mac games

Other / Misc

- $100 iTunes Gift Card for $85
- Adobe Photoshop Elements 11 for $44.99
- iOS Game Controller iCADE, iCADE 8-Bitty, and JOYSTICK-IT
- MacSales (OWC) Black Friday Sale - Mac accessories, hard drives, memory
- Bear Extender Bundle - Wi-Fi extender
- Refurbished iPod Classic, iPod Touch, iPads - from Woot

- Freeway Express and Exhibeo are 50% off
- Carbon Copy Cloner - 20% Off with Coupon Code GIVETHANKS
- Equinux - 50% off. Mail Designer, Stationery Pack, iSale, CoverScout and VPN Tracker

Updates:

- Fry's has 13" Retina MacBook Pro for $200 Off ($1699->$1499). (In Store Only now)
- Das Keyboard (Mechanical Keyboard) 20% Off

Please note that prices may fluctuate during the day. Several of the vendors listed are affiliate partners with MacRumors and referred sales may benefit the site financially. Please send in any notable sales to tips@macrumors.com.

Following the international launches, Apple has kicked off its Black Friday sale in the U.S. Online Apple Store. The selection of products on discount are the same as the international stores. The discounted products are listed:

- iPad with Retina Display - $41 Off
- iPad 2 - $31 Off
- iPod touch - $ 31 Off
- iPod touch 4th Generation - $21 Off
- iPod nano - $11 Off
- MacBook Pro with Retina - $101 Off
- MacBook Pro - $101 Off
- MacBook Air - $101 Off
- Various Accessories

Both Best Buy and MacMall seem to have deeper discounts on select products in their base configuration. The other thing to consider is that Apple and Best Buy will charge sales tax in most states due to their national retail presence.

Black Friday is about to officially kick off, and the App Store developers also use this as an opportunity to promote their apps by dropping their prices. Sister site AppShopper.com tracks all price changes on iOS Apps and Mac Apps in their respective App Stores. Here's a selection of some of the more notable sales for iOS and Mac App Stores, as well as other online and boxed software sales.

iOS Apps

- Readdle Docs for iPad ($4.99 -> $1.99)
- Documents To Go Premium ($16.99 -> $9.99)
- QuickOffice Pro ($14.99 -> $0.99)
- QuickOffice Pro HD ($19.99 -> $4.99)
- Star Walk ($2.99 -> $1.99)
- Star Walk for iPad ($2.99 -> $1.99)
- Momento (Diary/Journal) ($2.99 -> $0.99)
- Groove 2 - Music Player ($3.99 -> $0.99)
- 1Password for iPhone ($9.99 -> $6.99)
- 1Password for iPad ($9.99 -> $6.99)
- 1Password Pro ($14.99 -> $9.99)
- MagicalPad ($1.99 -> Free)

- NAVIGON iOS USA ($49.99->$24.99)
- NAVIGON iOS North America ($59.99 -> $29.99)
- NAVIGON iOS MyRegion ($29.99 -> $14.99)
- StreetPilot Onboard USA ($49.99 -> $24.99)
- StreetPilot Onboard North America ($59.99 -> $29.99)

- $100 iTunes Gift Card for $80 - from BestBuy

Mac Apps

- 1Password ($49.99 -> $34.99)
- Pixelmator ($29.99 -> $14.99)
- Prototypes ($39.99 -> $19.99)
- Socialite ($9.99 -> $4.99)
- Home Inventory ($14.99 -> $7.99)
- Instamac ($1.99 -> $0.99)

- Primate Labs (Geekbench) - 40% off

Mac Games

- Steam Online Store - Autumn Sale with ongoing discounts. Presently includes Portal 2 for $4.99.
- MacGameStore - Up to 80% Off on Mac games

iOS Games

Games are huge category on their own making up a large portion of the activity on the App Store. TouchArcade has rounded up the various sales from major developers and notable indie developers:

- Sales from Gameloft, Sega, Namco, and Indies
- Sales from EA, Chillingo, Firemonkeys, and PopCap

- iCADE, iCade 8-Bitty and JOYSTICK-IT - Hardware controllers on sale.

Boxed Software / Other

- Adobe Photoshop Elements 11 ($99.99 -> $44.99)
- TurboTax Deluxe Federal + E-File + State 2012 ($59.99 -> $49.69)
- Office for Mac Home & Student 2011 ($119.99 -> $79.99)
- Office for Mac Home & Student 2011 (Family Pack) ($149.99 -> $89.99)
- Parallels Desktop 8 ($79.95 -> $49.42)
- VMWare Fusion 5 ($49.99 -> $31.99)
- Jumsoft - 50% off all their templates and elements for Keynote, iWork, Pages, and more. Coupon Code: BF2012
- Adobe Lightroom 4 ($149 -> $99.99)

Mac Software Bundles

- MacUtility Bundle ($59.99) - Parallels Desktop 8, Snagit, VirusBarrier X6, MacOptimizer, Rubbertnet ($245 Value)
- MacLegion Bundle ($49.99)- TechTool Pro, Freeway Pro, djay, Capo, Fantastical, RipIt, iRip, Beamer, Copy Paste Pro, Code Collector Pro ($548.80 Value)

Some links may be affiliate links where available

Apple has launched its one day Black Friday sales in Australia and New Zealand. The discounts available are for the following products:

BestBuy launched its Thanksgiving Weekend, Black Friday and one-day-only "Doorbuster" sales today. Most of their sales run from Thursday to Saturday. These include discounts on many Mac products that are better than the ones from MacMall posted yesterdaty. We've highlighted the deeper savings here on several Apple notebook models:

Online retailer MacMall has kicked off their 60 hour Black Friday sale just now. The sale runs until midnight on Friday. Traditionally, 3rd party retailers have offered better discounts than Apple once sales tax is taken into account. MacRumors is an affiliate partner of MacMall.

According to a post on the MacRumors Forums, Apple is asking record labels to submit pictures and galleries of their artists to iTunes for use in iTunes 11's new Music Store layout.

AppleInsider reports that Apple has nearly caught up with demand for the iPhone 5. This is based on data gathered by Piper Jaffray in nightly checks of 100 retail Apple Stores.

AT&T appears to be quietly extending FaceTime-Over-Cellular capabilities to all their iPhone customers. Earlier this month, AT&T announced that they would allow any customer "with an LTE device" on a "tiered data plan" to use iOS 6's FaceTime over Cellular feature.

This, however, excluded a number of customers, including those with grandfathered unlimited data plans as well as those with the iPhones 4S. (Note, iOS 6, itself, can only supports FaceTime-over-Cellular on the 4S, 5 and iPad 3rd Gen or higher)

Tonight, Forum user kre62 noticed that both his iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 with unlimited AT&T data plans now support FaceTime over cellular.

In a recent thread we were discussing AT&T members getting facetime with LTE devices and tiered plans. However I noticed today that I have facetime over cellular and I have an unlimited plan on my 5.

I just turned off my other phone, a 4S and turned it back on, only to find the switch flipped to ON for facetime over cellular. Both phones work perfectly over cellular.

I also checked a few coworkers phones, all now have FT over cellular.

This finding has been confirmed by a number of users in this discussion thread -- though some users have been unable to activate it so it may still be rolling out to some areas. AT&T had said the original rollout for tiered plans could take 8-10 weeks. Most of the positive responses have been those with the iPhone 5 and grandfathered unlimited data, but the original poster also had luck with an iPhone 4S.

Some users have had to completely restart their phones for the service to go into effect. There still remains a possibility that this is an oversight on AT&T's part. We are reaching out to AT&T for clarification on their policy.

Apple just posted two new iPhone 5 television ads. The ads are entitled 'Orchestra' and 'Turkey'. Orchestra focuses on the microphones that Apple uses to reduce background noise during calls. Turkey shows off the Shared Photo Stream feature of iOS 6.

Last December, an apparent bug appeared in Apple's iMessage service that caused iMessages to continue to be linked to a stolen iPhone. The customer's messages would continue to arrive and be sent from the stolen phone even after changing passwords, a remote wipe, and a SIM card deactivation. Apple initially denied it was a bug, but did later compensate at least one affected user for her trouble.

According to a survey done by Nielsen, U.S. consumers aged 6-12 are significantly more interested in purchasing Apple's iOS products over the next 6 months. The new Nintendo Wii U took the #2 spot, but lagged well behind the iPad. Meanwhile, the iPod Touch, iPad Mini and the iPhone rounded out the rest of the top 5 most wanted products for this age group.