Walmart is running another Deals Holiday Kickoff sale before Black Friday

UPDATE: Oct. 25, 2023, 1:00 p.m. EDT This story has been updated.

When it comes to holiday programming, Walmart typically has its Black Friday plans set in stone by mid-October. In 2022, it trumpeted the return of its monthlong Black Friday Deals for Days event on Oct. 19. The year prior, its announcement came on Oct. 18. And in 2020, it arrived out of the blue on Oct. 14.

Strangely, we still haven’t heard a peep about Black Friday 2023 at the big box store as of Wednesday, Oct. 25 — but it did just revive its Walmart Deals Holiday Kickoff event, an online sale from earlier this month. The event opens to all shoppers at 2 p.m. ET following a two-hour early access period for paid Walmart+ members.

The first Walmart Deals Holiday Kickoff event ran alongside Amazon Prime Big Deal Days from Oct. 9 to 12 and dropped prices on hundreds of items sitewide, but the current iteration has no set runtime and only 10 total “deals you can’t miss.” This includes a $278 65-inch 4K Roku TV, two refurbished iPad bundles, a $199 LG stick vacuum, and a $99 dupe for the GE Profile Opal Nugget Ice Maker. (For what it’s worth, the TV is probably the only item that’s actually “can’t-missable” — Walmart won’t have a hard time one-upping the other doorbusters during its formal Black Friday sale.)

This “early access for paid Walmart+ members” formatting is new for this version of the Holiday Deals Kickoff event, however. It’s also reminiscent of the past two Black Friday Days for Days sales, which had three to seven hours of early access for paid Walmart+ members. It could be a sign that Walmart is inching closer to its official Black Friday rollout, which is long overdue at this point. We’ve reached out to a representative for Walmart for more information and will update this story if/when we hear back.

The only retailer that has confirmed its Black Friday plans thus far is Best Buy, which will be releasing some early Black Friday deals over the weekend. (Paid members of its My Best Buy program get exclusive access to them from Oct. 27 to 29 before everyone can shop them starting Oct. 30.) The official Best Buy Black Friday sale will run for nine days from Nov. 17 to Nov. 25 before it shifts into Cyber Monday mode for the following two days.

This story is developing.