Amazon’s unlocked Fire Phone is now just $199

Fire Phone's cheap at $199, but it's still hard to recommend it. Photo: Amazon

Fire Phone’s cheap at $199, but it’s still hard to recommend it. Photo: Amazon

Amazon is hoping to shift some of its unsold Fire Phone stock by reducing the price of the unlocked, off-contract model to just $199. That’s a whopping $450 off its original price tag, and it comes less than six months after the Fire Phone made its debut in the U.S.

No, this isn’t a limited-time Black Friday deal; the Fire Phone’s price tag is only ever going to go down from here.

That’s because Amazon has been having an incredibly tough time trying to sell the device, which has cost the retail giant around $170 million so far. Back in October, it was reported that around 85,000 Fire Phone handsets were collecting dust in warehouses because they simply could not be sold.

Perhaps Amazon will have better luck now that the device is just $199 off-contract.

That’s a pretty nice price for a device with these specifications, which include a 4.7-inch 720p display, 1 2.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, 2GB of RAM, and a 13-megapixel camera with optical image stabilization. Of course, the only problem is, you’re stuck with Amazon’s own Fire OS platform, which does not have Google Play or other popular Google apps.

Amazon reduced the Fire Phone to just 99 cents on contract only two months after the handset went on sale, and it has since conceded that it did not get its pricing right for the launch. But despite all of that, the company won’t give up on the smartphone just yet, and still has plans for a Fire Phone 2.

If you’re wondering whether similar discounts have been applied to the Fire Phone in the U.K., the answer’s no. The 32GB model will still cost you £399 through Amazon.co.uk, which is more than the new Moto X, the LG G3, the Galaxy S5, and the One M8 — any of which would be a better buy.