Apple Gift Guide 2022

Looking for a reasonably-priced gift for an Apple fan? Sick of seeing suggestions like iPhones and MacBook Pros? Here are some real-life ideas for gifts that prioritize fun over function.



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Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Here's my Apple Gift Guide for 2022.
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So in coming up with gift ideas I have certain rules that are going to make my list very different than any other gift guide list you see online. The first rule is nothing too expensive. A lot of gift guides will suggest things like iPhones and MacBook Pro. But those are out of the price range for most people giving gifts to somebody else. Second, is gifts should bring more joy than utility. So a practical gift like a MacBook or something for school isn't going to be on my list. These are going to be gifts that will bring more fun than function. Third, is surprise factor. If you have to talk to the other person to figure out what they need, what they want, work with them to get this gift then it's not on my list. This should be something you should be able to surprise somebody with. If it is already on their wishlist and you're just selecting it from the wishlist, well it is really not a surprise then. These are ideas for when you don't know what to get the person. Finally, one of the favorite things that people might not get for themselves. They might think they are too frivolous or they just don't have the budget to get this item which really doesn't have much of utility for them.
So let's start looking at Apple products themselves. Not accessories. But main products. I'm going to start with the most expensive thing on this list. This will be a new iPad. The regular iPad, not the Pro, not the Air, not the Mini and not the new 10th generation iPad which is priced pretty high at $449. But you can still get the 9th generation iPad from Apple for $329. Which is a pretty reasonable price and you could find it elsewhere, usually, for somewhere around $269. I see this price pretty often. So if you can't find the 9th generation iPad for $269 today, try again tomorrow. The great thing about an iPad for somebody that already has an iPhone or a Mac is you can use the iPad for just a lot of fun things. You can watch streaming TV shows, for instance, on it. You can play games that maybe the iPhone screen is a little too small for. It works great as a machine to FaceTime somebody or to bring along when you want access the internet or check your email but you don't want to bring your Mac along and maybe your iPhone screen is too small for what you want to do.
Next, I'm going to suggest the Apple Watch. Now the latest Apple Watches are pretty expensive. But you can get the Apple Watch SE for $249. Which makes it a pretty reasonable gift. It's really great for somebody who has an iPhone but hasn't splurged on themselves to get an Apple Watch. If they are into fitness and all they are probably really going to like this.
Next, I have a gift that I'm going to recommend because somebody gave it to me as a gift. Originally I didn't want to get AirPods. I thought I would loose them. They would fall out of my ears and all of that. But that wasn't the case. I've had my first generation AirPods for five years now and I still use them everyday even though I have Air Pods Pro that I also use sometimes. You can get them for $169 and I'm sure if you know somebody that doesn't have AirPods but they listen to music, they listen to audiobooks, they probably have been curious but maybe not willing to spend the money themselves and this would make a really good gift for them.
Here's another gift that Apple fans in your life may not have gotten for themselves but they certainly would love to get as a gift. It's the HomePod Mini. At only $99 it's a really good speaker that will fill the room with sound and you can use Siri with it as well.
Now let's move onto accessories. But first I want to talk about some accessories that I think should not be gifts. One of them is a product I actually like and I have many of them myself. The AirTag. I see AirTags on every gift guide. One gift guide even features them as the top gift. I think they make horrible gifts. They are completely for utility. They maybe fun to get for about two minutes. Then from that point on they are the gift you hope you never need to use. I think AirTags are a great thing to buy for yourself if you think you need them. But to give them as a gift I just don't like it.
I also want to include other accessories in here like cables and docks for Macs and iPads and such. Those make horrible gifts. They are for utility and the person whose buying them should know what they want and get them because they need them. Not as a gift. They are not fun at all. Also cases. Cases for iPhones. Cases for iPads. Cases for MacBooks. These are things that are highly personal. If somebody is getting a case they probably want it to be a specific color, a specific style, made out of the type of material they like. Surprising somebody with a case, unless it is from their wishlist or something, they probably are not going to get what they really want. So I'd avoid those as gifts.
Now something I think does make a good gift is an extra battery for your iPhone especially if the person you know always seems to be running out of battery towards the end of the day. Maybe they use their iPhone pretty heavily especially with apps like Instagram and TicTok and it really runs the battery down and they could use an extra battery pack. Maybe they have one but they didn't spend enough money to get a decent one. So a good battery pack would make a good gift. Apple actually sells the MagSafe Battery Pack. It's a $100 and it snaps onto the back of any iPhone that's MagSafe. It's much higher quality than what most people are willing to spend. After all you're probably going to end up spending like $30 or $40 to get a cheap one for yourself. So it could be nice to get a nice one like this as a gift.
Now you can also go with a third party one. There are some that are MagSafe and there are ones that just plug into your phone. My advice is always avoid the little ones. The tiny ones. Get ones that are pretty big. About the size of the iPhone or larger. That can charge an iPhone many times over. These should last for years whereas the small ones sometimes fail after just a few uses. It's hard to find these with outputs that are USBC which is unfortunate since the latest cables from Apple have USBC on one end. You should definitely look for at least an input being USBC so you can easily charge it using the latest adapters.
Also speaking of MagSafe I know there are a lot of iPhone owners that have gotten a new iPhone, it has MagSafe, but they haven't bought any MagSafe charger of any kind. They are really missing out. Being able to snap the back of your iPhone to a MagSafe charger to charge is really convenient. If they don't have any MagSafe stuff and they do have a MagSafe iPhone maybe just get them the $40 MagSafe Charger from Apple. It is just a cable and it snaps onto the back. Or you can get a third party station that they can use on their nightstand. Sometimes it charges multiple devices at the same time.
One word or warning though. You can't use a MagSafe charger if you have a regular case on your iPhone, one that doesn't support MagSafe. There are tons of MagSafe compatible cases out there, though.
Now if the person you're getting a gift for already has an Apple watch a good gift could be an Apple Watch Band or collection of bands. These can be really cheap. You can search and find sets of them. Several that go for under $20 easily and it's nice to have options for different styles for your Apple Watch just to change it up or to go with different outfits.
Now here's something a little unusual for a Mac owner but these also work with iPads and iPhones too in a lot of cases. A Mini Keyboard. Mini keyboards run somewhere around $100. There's a bunch of different ones and they can be a lot of fun to play with. They all work with GarageBand which is free from Apple. So you can use them right away to create music. They are just fun to play with even if you don't do any music professionally.
Another unusual option is a game controller. So if you haven't been paying attention Apple products have moved towards being able to use game controllers from other systems. For instance, Apple sells the Sony Playstation game controller on its site. You can get that. Use an Xbox controller as well. There are a whole bunch of third party controllers at different price ranges. You can get these two from Apple but you can get tons more that are compatible with the iPhone, iPad, and the Mac if you search on other sites like Amazon. More and more games will work with these even if they work with a touchscreen they may also work with a controller and be easier and more fun to play.
Here's another unusual idea. A mini photo printer. Now in the past I've wanted to suggest these as gifts but they have usually been over $100. Now there's a bunch that are less than $100. So you get these. They basically have little batteries in them so you can carry them with. They print on these little stickers and you can print on demand. So it kind of turns your iPhone into a polaroid camera where you can take a picture and then printout one to give to somebody or to stick on your refrigerator or whatever. A hidden price in all of these is getting the little packs of paper. So make sure you buy one that comes with, at least, a small sample pack, like ten, and check to see how much it cost for the paper. Usually you can get for about $25 a set of 50. These definitely aren't for professional use. They are just for fun which makes them a really good gift.
Now if you can't figure out what to get an Apple fan you can always get them an Apple gift card. The great thing about gift cards today is one Apple gift card works across all the Apple Stores and App Stores and all of that. In the past that wasn't true. You had to get the right gift card. But now you can just get one Apple gift card, the person can use to buy an app, they can use it to buy a movie, they can put it towards a product purchase, whatever they want. They can also send a specific digital product to somebody as a gift. It's a little tricky to do though. First if you want to send somebody something from the App Store, the iTunes Store like music, or a book you have to do it from an iPhone or an iPad. The apps there will allow you to gift an item. You can gift some music from the iTunes Store from the Apple Music App on your Mac. But it doesn't work in the App Store app on the Mac. It doesn't work on the TV app on either platform. So you can't yet gift a movie to somebody. But if you have a favorite iPhone or iPad game that you've been playing and you want to gift that to somebody, if somebody wants music you can go to the iTunes Store and you can gift them an album. More if they use their iPad to read in the Books App you can gift them that book in the Books App.
So there are my suggestions for gifts for this year for Apple fans. I'd love to hear your suggestions as well in the comments. Thanks for watching.
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