Thinking of the best tech gift for someone can be hard, but the process is worth it. If you’re a tech-focused gifter like me and are struggling with what to gift your friends, family members, or significant others, I have a set of tips to help you out. Remember, you just need to find a match between your giftee’s interests and a tech device or gadget that could delight them or make their life easier.
Feeling lazy? Here are some online gifts you can buy and send without ever having to leave your couch.
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- 1. Gift Something of Utility to Your Less Tech-Savvy Giftee
- 2. Gift Something Aesthetic to Your Tech Nerd Giftee
- 3. Gift a New Tech Experience to Your Senior Family Member
- 4. Gift Something Offbeat to Your Younger Siblings
- 5. Gift a Fun Gaming Experience to Kids
1. Gift Something of Utility to Your Less Tech-Savvy Giftee
Choosing a gift for someone who’s extremely comfortable around technology is often easy as you and the giftee probably appreciate a lot of the same stuff. But, for those less tech-savvy than others, you might need to take a few steps back and really assess their lifestyle.
- What devices do they use daily?
- What are some products that can enhance their experience with those devices?
- Have they mentioned they’ve been looking for a solution to a particular tech problem?
In my case, I was on a deadline as I had to think of a useful gift for my partner just a week before Valentine’s Day. While she has a lot of Apple devices, she doesn’t really use the ecosystem features at all. So, yet another Apple device was not an option. And I didn’t want to gift an iPhone accessory yet again.
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Then I remembered that she had mentioned (more than once) how flimsy and flat her Magic Keyboard felt compared to my own mechanical keyboard. So, I bought a Keychron K8 to finally introduce her to mechanical keyboard heaven.
The keyboard is wireless, compact, compatible with Mac (with extra keycaps), and can be connected to 3 devices for seamless productivity. She could continue to use all her favorite shortcuts while enjoying a superior typing experience.
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Need to replace your Magic Keyboard? Consider one of these alternatives to Apple’s Magic Keyboard.
2. Gift Something Aesthetic to Your Tech Nerd Giftee
I did mention that it’s easier to gift your tech nerd friends, didn’t I? Still, there are times when you can’t think of anything worthwhile or something they don’t already have. In such cases, you could go the aesthetic route and gift them something to adorn their work desk with — a figurine or a fancy digital clock.
You could also pick something that’s a cross between utility and aesthetics — a smart thermos with an LED temperature display or a smart desk lamp.
While thinking about what to gift my gamer friend for his birthday, I remembered his love for motorbikes, the Ducati Panigale specifically. So, I ordered a 1:18 Ducati Panigale model for him to keep on his desk. Needless to say, he was ecstatic.
Need more gift ideas for gamers? You could gift them Steam games within the genre they like. Find cheap Steam bundles on websites like Fanatical.
3. Gift a New Tech Experience to Your Senior Family Member
Our circle of friends often consists of people our own age, and consequently, it’s relatively simpler to pick tech gifts for them. But, for a senior family member, or even someone significantly older than you, you might find yourself racking your brain.
Gifting a tech product to an older friend or family member should achieve two things:
- It shouldn’t be too dissimilar to the tech devices they’re already familiar with
- It should (ideally) add some value to their routine
For these reasons, I decided to gift a Samsung Galaxy Tab A9+ to my mother for her 60th birthday. A budget Android tablet like this one was perfect for her as she had already been using an Android phone for years (an iPad would have been too different for her). And thanks to the decent battery life, good speakers, and large screen, she could use it for video calls and watching videos.
4. Gift Something Offbeat to Your Younger Siblings
Ah, your younger siblings. You’ll never be cool enough for them, whatever fancy tech gift you give them this time. So, it’s a much better idea to go offbeat and pick a gift that’ll add a new dimension to their room, commute, or fitness routine. This could be a magnetic phone holder for their gym sessions or a universal travel adapter.
When I had to think of something to gift my younger brother, I wanted to pick something that he wouldn’t think of himself. I landed on a Govee LED light bulb that he could control from his phone and program to show any color he wanted. He could even sync it to music playback and set the bulb to dim or brighten in the night and morning, as needed.
This smart LED bulb fit perfectly with his room makeover and was something he never thought of before.
5. Gift a Fun Gaming Experience to Kids
When it comes to kids, choosing the perfect gift is a wildly different task. Kids these days change interests and gadgets on a whim, and you might never know what’s trending at the moment. Even if you think you know the giftee well, they might already have the toy or game you have in mind.
For this reason, I feel it’s helpful to gift them something that’s slightly vintage and before their time. Maybe an older board game that they never heard of or a couple of Beyblades for some good ol’ fashioned fun.
In my case, I finalized a handheld retro game console containing hundreds of 8-bit era games. Its battery is enough for 5 hours and it can even be connected to a TV for large-screen entertainment. Compared to a PS5, Xbox Series X, or Nintendo Switch that they might already have, this retro console would feel like a breath of fresh air. And for less than $20, even a few weeks of fun is enough.
The best tech gifts need not be expensive or complicated. As long as they add a touch of excitement and fun to your giftee’s life, they more than fulfill their purpose. It should be something that would enhance their lifestyle, open them up to a new experience, or simply give them something to play with for a few weeks or months.
What’s on your wish list? Are you sure you really want the Apple Vision Pro?
Image credit: Unsplash.
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Tanveer Singh
After a 7-year corporate stint, Tanveer found his love for writing and tech too much to resist. An MBA in Marketing and the owner of a PC building business, he writes on PC hardware, technology, video games, and Windows. When not scouring the web for ideas, he can be found building PCs, watching anime, or playing Smash Karts on his RTX 3080 (sigh).
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