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The Best Labor Day Deals on Amazon Right Now

It’s almost Labor Day in the U.S., and like most holidays, it’s a time to save money on your favorite gadgets. Before we get to that, though, I want to thank everyone who has followed MacStories Deals on Mastodon and Bluesky.

We brought back MacStories Deals after a seven-year hiatus because I wasn’t happy with any of the deal sites or social media accounts I was following myself. The volume of posts was too great, and the quality of the deals was often suspect, but in the end it all came down to a case of French’s Yellow Mustard.

One day while scrolling through Ivory, I came across a deal for a case of 12 bottles of mustard for $9. That’s a pretty great deal, but it’s not what I wanted.

Amazon and Apple’s stores are full of deeply discounted products, but most of them aren’t what I want to see. The websites and social media accounts following those deals aren’t very discriminating, either, because they’re all about getting people to click links at scale.

Our bet with MacStories Deals is that we can succeed in a much different way. Our occasional deal roundups here and the media picks and deals on MacStories Unwind showed us that the deals we share are popular with the MacStories community because we’re picky. You can get a firehose of deals anywhere, but what you get from us – and now from MacStories Deals – is an editorial filter that respects your time by eliminating the noise.

So instead of sharing as many deals as possible, our approach is to share just a handful of deals each day and supplement MacStories Deals with the occasional post on the site when the deal volume warrants it. In an era when AI is flooding the zone with slop and lowering the common denominator for all content, we believe that experience and editorial constraints will serve the MacStories community better.

So thanks again for following MacStories Deals on Mastodon and Bluesky. It’s just one small project of many that are in the works, but I hope you all appreciate the approach and take advantage of a deal here and there while we earn a small commission from your purchases.

Now, on to the Labor Day deals.

M4 MacBook Airs

The 2025 13-inch M4 MacBook Air in Midnight.

The 2025 13-inch M4 MacBook Air in Midnight.

Students are returning to school, and many will be looking for deals on Mac laptops. Currently, every M4 MacBook Air in both the 13-inch and 15-inch configurations is at an all-time low price on Amazon. The MacBook Air is one of my favorite portable computers of all time, and now is a great time to pick one up.

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Apple Announces September 9 Awe Dropping Event

Today, Apple announced that it will host an event entitled “Awe Dropping” on September 9, 2025, at 10:00 AM Pacific Time. The company is expected to announce the iPhone 17 line, including the new iPhone 17 Air, alongside new Apple Watches and potentially AirPods Pro.

The event will be streamed live globally on Apple’s Events page as well as on YouTube and in the Apple TV app. Some members of the media were invited to watch the event in person at the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple Park.

The MacStories team will be covering all the details of the event, so stay tuned and get ready for September 9.

Podcast Rewind: European Software and Smoke

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

Comfort Zone

Niléane brings some “classic” headphones, Chris is in possession of The Big Ball, and everyone tries to go a little bit more European.

Magic Rays of Light

Sigmund and Devon discuss the latest Apple TV hardware rumors and recap Apple Original drama Smoke.

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The iOS 26 Features Not Coming to Older iPhones

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Each fall’s major iOS update and its accompanying set of new features have become a staple of the iPhone user experience. iPhone owners – even those who don’t keep up with all the latest Apple news – expect and anticipate these enhancements every year. However, for those who aren’t on the latest-generation devices, it may not always be clear which of this year’s new features you’ll have access to. Even if a device supports iOS 26, that doesn’t necessarily mean it will be able to run every system feature.

To save you from having to comb through a bunch of footnotes on Apple’s website or, worse, wait until this fall to find out which capabilities your device will support, I’ve compiled a list of all the iOS 26 features that are limited to newer iPhones. Here’s what you can expect based on the model you’re using.

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Podcast Rewind: A Big Ball and The Buccaneers

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

Comfort Zone

Matt wonders why there are so many face computers, Niléane has an awesome podcast app update, and Chris figures out which of two compelling pitches he gets to buy.

Magic Rays of Light

Sigmund and Devon break down the variations in video and audio quality across streaming and recap the second season of The Buccaneers.

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Apple Announces Redesigned Blood Oxygen Feature for U.S. Watch Market

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Since 2023, Apple has been locked in a dispute with Masimo over patents related to the Apple Watch’s Blood Oxygen feature. That meant for more than 18 months, Apple Watches in the U.S. were sold without Blood Oxygen monitoring.

Today, the company announced that:

Apple will introduce a redesigned Blood Oxygen feature for some Apple Watch Series 9, Series 10, and Apple Watch Ultra 2 users through an iPhone and Apple Watch software update coming later today.

The update doesn’t affect watches in the U.S. that already had Blood Oxygen feature or watches sold elsewhere in the world.

According to Apple, today’s update was enabled by a recent U.S. Customs ruling, and:

Following this update, sensor data from the Blood Oxygen app on Apple Watch will be measured and calculated on the paired iPhone, and results can be viewed in the Respiratory section of the Health app.

It’s good to see the Blood Oxygen feature returning to all Apple Watches, and not just future hardware releases. It will be interesting to see how the redesigned feature, which requires an iPhone, compares to the original feature that is no longer available in new hardware.

Podcast Rewind: The Ideal AI App and Nintendo’s Pricing Changes

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

AppStories

This week, Federico and John pick and choose their favorite AI app features to imagine a better AI app future, critiquing the leading LLM apps along the way. And as a bonus, John explains why read-later apps should support Shortcuts and other automation schemes.

On AppStories+, the critique continues with a look at how Todoist could be improved.

This episode is sponsored by:

  • Factor – Healthy, fully-prepared food delivered to your door. Use code appstories50off

NPC: Next Portable Console

This week, Brendon and John mind the show while Federico is on vacation, covering Nintendo’s pricing changes, the latest on Retroid’s second screen accessory, the TrinketOS Android front end, Manic EMU for iOS, and more.

Then, for Patreon members, John and Brendon share what they’d like to see from a Steam Deck 2 and consider the intersection of No Phone Summer and retro handhelds.

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Podcast Rewind: The watchOS 26 Public Beta, Audio Experiments, and an Alien Intervention

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

Comfort Zone

Chris wants to talk about OS 26 (but Liquid Glass is OFF LIMITS), Matt found a slick new security camera, and Niléane challenges the gang to downgrade their audio setups.

MacStories Unwind

This week, John is joined by Jonathan Reed to recap the watchOS 26 public beta and share a trio of comedies old and new, along with Brendon Bigley’s new project and a classic monster movie deal.

Magic Rays of Light

Sigmund and Devon highlight the second season premiere of Apple Original comedy series Platonic and the debut of historical drama Chief of War.

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Apple Expands Its U.S. Manufacturing Commitment

In February, Apple announced plans to invest $500 billion in the U.S. over the next four years. Today, that commitment was increased to $600 billion. In the company’s press release, Tim Cook said:

Today, we’re proud to increase our investments across the United States to $600 billion over four years and launch our new American Manufacturing Program. This includes new and expanded work with 10 companies across America. They produce components that are used in Apple products sold all over the world, and we’re grateful to the President for his support.

One of the first deals announced is an expansion of Apple’s relationship with Corning to make all cover glass for the iPhone and Apple Watch at a Corning plant in Kentucky. That deal is part of what Apple calls its American Manufacturing Program, in which Coherent, GlobalWafers America (GWA), Applied Materials, Texas Instruments (TI), Samsung, GlobalFoundries, Amkor, and Broadcom will also participate. Apple says the program builds on its deal to buy rare earth magnets from MP Materials, a July 2025 deal that was announced shortly after the unusual sale of $400 million of MP Materials’ preferred stock to the U.S. Department of Defense.

Apple continues to be under a lot of political pressure to make its devices in the U.S., despite its prior financial commitments to make components in America. Another $100 billion over four years is a lot, but I suspect this won’t be enough. Instead, I expect we’ll see more of this type of announcement, given how quickly the first half a trillion was followed by another $100 billion.