SaleDrop

How to spot a fake sale

The five tells that a discount is doing more marketing than saving.

By the SaleDrop deals desk · Updated 18 Aug 2026

A sale is designed to make you decide quickly. These five checks take less than a minute and put the decision back in your hands.

1. Do not start with the was-price

The crossed-out number is the easiest part of a listing to inflate, and it is the one figure we cannot check from before we started tracking. Treat it as marketing, not information, until you have looked at the item's real recorded history.

2. Look for a price that has actually moved

A genuine markdown shows up as a step down in the price history. A flat line at one price for months, suddenly labelled a "sale", usually just means the standard price has a new sticker.

3. Check the lowest price on record

If today's price matches or beats the lowest we have ever seen, that is a strong signal. If it is well above the record low, the deal is weaker than it looks.

4. Compare to the usual price, not the was-price

The number that matters is what the item normally holds at, not what the retailer claims it once cost. The saving against the usual price is the real saving.

5. Be wary of unknown brands at huge discounts

An 80% saving on a brand you have never heard of, with no price history, is the classic shape of an inflated was-price. Genuine deals on known brands tend to be more modest and better supported by the data.

What an inflated was-price looks like

Keep reading

The truth about was-prices

What our price tracking shows about the crossed-out number on the badge.

What "up to 70% off" really means

The oldest trick in sale copy, and how to read past it.

The biggest genuine price drops we have recorded

Measured against the price each item actually held, not the badge.

See it in the live data

See all