Amazon is now offering its fully unlocked Fire Phone for only $199.
Despite the $250 discount, every purchase still comes with unlimited cloud storage and a full year of Prime (a $99 value).
Amazon has been struggling to drum up interest in its 4.7-inch handset since its summertime launch; the company lost $170 million in the last quarter, and was left with an $83 million surplus in unsold phones.
Those looking to avoid a carrier contract, however, would have to shell out $649 for the 32GB version. Amazon eventually dropped that number to $449, which still didn't drive sales.
So as you make your list and check it twice this holiday season, the e-retailer hopes shoppers will be swayed by the reasonable $199 price tag, which includes a full year of Prime benefits.
Just remember: The GSM device is still U.S.-only, and is compatible with AT&T and T-Mobile, not CDMA networks like Verizon or Sprint.
Amazon in June unveiled its first smartphone, but all of its bells and whistles weren't enough to boost the 4.7-inch handset, with 1,280-by-720 resolution, a 2.2GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, Adreno 330 GPU, and 2GB of RAM to the top of the heap.
The handset received a "good" rating of 3.5-out-of-five stars in PCMag's review, earning high marks for its solid build and unique features. But a heavy focus on selling users Amazon products and a limited app selection on the Fire OS did little to turn attention from rivals.
But Amazon will not be discouraged; the company said last month that it will continue developing new models—all the while hoping its handset catches on like its initially panned Kindle e-reader.
For more, see PCMag's review of the Amazon Fire Phone and the slideshow above.


