Is it July already? Not quite, but Amazon Prime Day is just around the corner. And it's never too early to start planning, because these are deals we're talking about!

Although the company has yet to announce the exact dates of the big event, which promises site-wide discounts on par with Black Friday. Here's what we know, based on the patterns of the past few Prime Days:

• It will almost certainly happen in mid-July.
• It will probably span more than one day. In 2017, Prime Day started late on a Monday and ended early on Wednesday. Last year, it lasted 36 hours, starting on Monday, July 16.
• The biggest discounts are likely to apply to Amazon's own products and brands, including the full range of Echo speakers, Fire tablets and Fire TV streamers, Kindle readers, Blink cameras and so on.

Obviously we'll keep you posted once we get more news about dates, deals and everything else.

Where can I find more Prime Day advice?

It's never too early to start learning the tricks of the Prime Day trade. For now, you can check out my main stories from last year:

• 5 ways to win Prime Day
• How to make sure that Prime Day deal is really a deal

Should I sign up for Amazon Prime now?

The big sale is exclusively for Amazon Prime subscribers, and an annual subscription costs $119 (or $13 per month if you don't want to pay all at once).

Worth it? If you're getting it just for Prime Day, then probably not. But Prime affords a whole bunch of other benefits, not the least of which are free two-day shipping on most products and lots of movies and TV shows from Prime Video.

If you don't want to pay for Prime but do want access to the Prime Day deals, here's one strategy: Sign up for Amazon's free 30-day Prime trial a few days before the sale. The only catch: That's for new subscribers only, so if you've done the trial or been a member before, you can't get another trial.

I can't wait for July. Where can I find good deals now?

Yes, July is many weeks away. But there are still plenty of sales and deals in the meantime. 

Check out Amazon's own Deals Page, which is updated daily. 

Read my own Cheapskate feed, where I identify great deals every weekday.

Check out CNET Deals, where we share aggregate a variety of deals from our retail partners and the web at large. 

Originally published on April 3, 2019.
Update, April 22: Minor updates.

CNET's Cheapskate scours the web for great deals on PCs, phones, gadgets and much more. Note that CNET may get a share of revenue from the sale of the products featured on this page. Questions about the Cheapskate blog? Find the answers on our FAQ page. Find more great buys on the CNET Deals page and follow the Cheapskate on Facebook and Twitter!