What to Know About Wayfair's Way Day 2022 Sale

Tips and tricks to get the best deals on furniture, appliances, rugs, and more

Wayfair logo with an illustrated sales tag surrounding it. Photo Illustration: Wayfair, iStock

Wayfair’s fifth annual Way Day sale is underway. So if you’ve been wanting a new couch or another piece of furniture, an area rug, or other home décor, lighting, or kitchen appliances, you may be able to save during the two-day sale.

Launched in April 2018, Way Day started as Wayfair’s answer to Amazon Prime Day. This year its annual sitewide sale kicked off at midnight ET Wednesday, April 27, and will run through Thursday, April 28. There are deals in virtually every category, including a handful of sales on CR-tested kitchen and cooking products.

To get the products you want and maximize your savings, you may want to be strategic when shopping the sale. This is especially important when buying furniture and décor online, when you can’t see items in person. Take the time to read reviews and compare prices with other retailers, and you may just find big discounts on great new furniture, décor, appliances, and more.

What's on Sale?

Wayfair says almost everything on the site will be on sale during Way Day, with discounts of up to 80 percent and prices the retailer claims are the lowest of the year. Shipping on all Way Day orders is free. And there are plenty of discounts on Wayfair’s brands—AllModern, Birch Lane, and Joss & Main—as well as on products from major brands like Weber, Sealy, KitchenAid, and Kohler.

While Wayfair may be best known for selling furniture and home décor, the online marketplace has a broader selection of products. This means Way Day is also a great time to score discounts on large appliances, grills, small kitchen tools, coffee makers, mattresses, vacuums, and more.

A majority of Way Day discounts should last the duration of the event. Beyond these price cuts, Wayfair also runs flash deals that last anywhere from a few hours to a full day, with new offers cropping up every hour throughout the sale.

How to Get a Good Deal on Way Day

It can be hard to tell whether a Way Day price is actually lower than the usual Wayfair price because many of the site’s products always appear to be discounted. But there are two easy ways to find out how good a deal really is: Research Wayfair’s prices ahead of time and compare prices with other retailers.

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Now that Wayfair’s sale is underway, you can’t see what the items cost before it began, which can make it hard to tell how good that discount really is. The next best step is to see what other retailers are charging for the same or similar items. This is a great tool especially if you didn’t get a chance to compare presale Wayfair prices before the big event.

When it comes to products outside of furniture and décor, such as large appliances, you’re likely to find them for sale at multiple retailers. Taking into account other factors, like shipping costs and times, as well as return policies, can give you a better idea of the best place to buy. So don’t let yourself be swayed by flashy advertising without doing a little research first.

If you’re researching furniture, it can be a little trickier to find other places where the same items are sold. To start, research the product and brand name online to see if you can find any matches. Retailers often have the same items listed under different brand names when it comes to furniture and décor, so if that search is a dead-end, try a reverse image search.

To do that, open up Google in your browser. Click on the word “Images” in the top right corner and a new search bar will appear. Then click on the camera icon on the right-hand side of the search bar and it will prompt you to upload a photo or paste an image URL. The search results will show you similar images.

When you spot a photo of the same product, you can navigate to the page where that image lives. In many cases, this will take you to another retailer, where you can compare prices and shipping options with Wayfair.

How to Avoid Low-Quality Items

Shopping online, especially for furniture and décor, can be tough because you can’t see the items in person. And remember, while it’s nice to save on a new couch, returning a large, bulky item can be a real hassle. So it’s especially important to do your research before you buy.

Though Consumer Reports doesn’t test individual pieces of furniture, you can check our ratings of 17 online furniture stores based on CR member feedback about their experiences shopping online. Wayfair ranks toward the top of the ratings, earning a good score for quality and showing up strong in the on-time delivery category.

You may also be able to find professional reviews of Wayfair brands, if not the specific pieces you’re considering.

Customer reviews can be useful as well. They may help you get a better idea of quality, ease of assembly, potential shipping issues, and even the accuracy of colors listed on the site, especially if they include a photo of the item in the review.

But because reviews from individual shoppers are subjective, read as many as you can and look for similarities. If only one or two people mention that their new chair arrived damaged, it may be a rare problem. But if a dozen reviews indicate the same issue, it may be a sign to keep searching for a higher-quality item.

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Head shot of CR Shopping Deals Editor Samantha Gordon

Samantha B. Gordon

I am an avid writer, editor, and consumer with an unusually deep love for finding amazing deals on amazing products, especially when those things can make my life, or yours, a little easier. When I'm not critiquing deals to find the best of the best, you can find me crafting on a barstool with a fancy cocktail or editing a science fiction novel (also with a cocktail). Follow me on Twitter (@sam_the_editor). 

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