15 Splurge-Worthy Gifts Worth the Premium Price

Technology usually gets better as it gets cheaper. The Galaxy Z Fold 6 is definitely better than the Fold 5, but somehow the price went up! Maybe because it has improved in every way, even if it’s only incrementally. The premium feel of the Fold 6 is due to a stronger, more durable frame, better components, and a fantastic camera system. You can unlock it with a fingerprint even when it's folded, and the fold crease is better hidden than ever. This is the pinnacle of folded phones right now.

Dyson’s approach is always to be top-of-the-line, price by damned. That certainly applies to the PB03, with its superb HEPA filtration. It put “formaldehyde” right in the name to underscore how well PB03 filters that pollutant out, along with NO2, CO2, and others. The 26.2-pound, 32-inch tall Big+Quiet can clean up a 1,076 square-foot room in no time and push out 21 gallons of purified air per second. That’s a clean worth the price. 

Set to launch this month, PlayStation 5 Pro will be replete with gaming at 60 frames per second, creating much better graphics that don't sacrifice performance. That requires paying a couple hundred bucks more and losing any option to have a disc-based game or play any Blu-rays. Thanks to PS5 Pro Game Boost, it will support 8,500 PS4 games. As analyst Will Greenwald notes, "It's bigger, faster, and more advanced than the PS5 in nearly every way, but it's not a PlayStation 6."

After the days of plasma TVs, Panasonic didn’t sell televisions in the US for a very long time, but now that has officially changed with the debut of the 65-inch 795A. It is the brightest OLED-based set we’ve ever tested, hitting a peak brightness of 230 nits. Plus, it’s incredibly thin (only 0.2 inches), has advanced spatial audio built right in (no soundbar needed), and uses the Amazon Fire TV/Alexa interface for all your smart TV interactions.

The base model of Falcon Norhtwest's Talon starts at a whopping $8,724, and if you opt for all the top-tier component options, it can cost well over $22,000. Even at that price, it’s a 4.5-star epic machine with a 2.5GHz 64-core AMD Ryze Threadripper Pro at its heart. Then there’s the hand-built quality to the case; a 280mm liquid cooling radiator for the CPU; and the killer the Nvidia RTX 6000 Ada Generation GPU. It all adds up to an easy choice for high-end work or play. 

Germany's high-end camera manufacturer, Leica, is a staple on this list every year. The M11-P gets down to brass tacks with a logo-less body (it's engraved on the top) in a design any photography lover will recognize. Plus, this model has more storage than the standard M11, a bright optical viewfinder, and supports Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) to mark photos as owned by the creator. That and more make it worth over $9,000 for the body alone. 

The MSI Claw puts full desktop-level Windows 11 gaming into a device the same size as a Nintendo Switch Lite. It works because MSI uses Intel Core Ultra chips for performance gains (albeit with the driver problems in our tests). If you can get past that and the console-level price of $799, this comfortable, powerful, and supremely flexible game device is just right for your gamer this season.

This rock-steady, easy-to-customize keyboard has everything the original 75% ROG Azoth has (including the hot-swappable ROG NX key switches, RGB lighting, and Bluetooth support), but with some excellent extras like the small color OLED touchscreen control at the upper right, a silicone and aluminum allow wrist rest, and the ability to change from hard to soft keystrokes or back again quickly. All in a hefty 4.8-pound keyboard that won’t slip out from any heavy grip.

Gaming headsets must be cool-looking, provide excellent audio, and connect to at least one game system. G Astro A50 X checks all three of those boxes, but also goes further by supporting connections to PCs, the PlayStation, and the Xbox. In fact, this headset acts as the full HDMI switch between your consoles if you plug them into the A50 X’s base station. It’s a must-have for those with multiple ways to game.

Apple's "spatial computing" headset, is arguably one of the best virtual reality headsets the world has ever seen. It has fantastic eye and hand tracking, without even holding a controller. The images on the 22-million-pixel display are sharp and colorful. The interface is the best devised. And at a starter price of $3,499 (with no signs of dropping even as production on the device slows), it’s the ultimate splurge gift of the season.

There was a time during the pandemic when graphics cards could cost as much as a car. Thankfully those times are behind us now, and we're back to reasonable prices. The RX 4080 Super Founders Edition, for example, not only drops the price to a still exorbitant splurge of around $1,000, but it also outperforms the standard RTX 80 in our tests. If you can afford it, it's well worth the investment!

With low lag, precise colors, bright HDR images, and a mind-bogglingly sharp 4K display crammed into a 32-inch panel, this phenomenal OLED monitor won our Editors’ Choice Award for gaming monitors without breaking a sweat. It doesn’t have much of a curve (which keeps the glare down) but that 4K resolution more than makes up for it. 

In our review of the ULT Tower 10, our audio experts say it has “enormous sound," and "house-shaking bass.” What more do you need to know about a $1,200 Bluetooth speaker that’s huge (43.3 inches tall and over 63.9 pounds) and specifically designed for parties? It's also built with music in mind, and with the Sony Music Center app and microphones, it can transform your living room into a full-on karaoke bar.

Apple products don’t come cheap, but you can always count on them for powerful performance. The 16-inch MacBook Pro is fully loaded (our test machine priced out at $3,649) with 48GB RAM and 2TB of SSD storage. Standard on this desktop replacement (which starts at $2,499.99) is Apple's M4 Pro processor and Liquid Retina XDR screen with a resolution of 3,456 by 2,234 pixels.

The Acer Chromebook Spin Plus 714 is easily the best Chromebook of the year, earning a perfect five stars for its exceptional blend of performance and design. This high-end 2-in-1 Chromebook features an attractive all-metal chassis and a sharp 14-inch touch screen, making it stylish in both laptop and tablet modes. Powered by an Intel Core Ultra processor, 8GB of memory, and a 256GB solid-state drive, it delivers impressive performance.