This page is a list of some great purchases I’ve made. Until advertising becomes much more efficient, many of the best purchases we make are direct suggestions from friends!
last updated: Jan 10 2025
Other Lists
Many others have made similar lists, so I’ll link them here should you want to browse them:
Luminettes: the best blue-light therapy glasses to use upon wake-up (these are the opposite of blue-light filtering glasses prior to bed), great if you have sleep/circadian rhythm issues
Label maker: it makes labels, which you should want
Collagen: not currently included on my supplements page so i’ve placed it here. one of the few supplements i often suggest
Aranet 4 Co2 monitor: all the AGI lab guys love this so it’s probably good. I never did find a consumer monitor for all other particulate matter types (vo2 etc) that was good though
Hue gradient strips: among the best lighting one can purchase for any surface out of line of sight. slightly better than the off-brand stuff but 8x the price. getting hue strips and floor lighting is generally always worth it imo
Hue bulbs: more expensive than some other solutions but worth it
Reolink PoE cameras: if you want cameras, Reolink makes no-bullshit (non-cloud) ones which are good. These require ethernet, but they have WiFi options
Cable cord hider: huge improvement if you want cables to be near-invisible in rooms. some say you can never overdo cable management
iPad Mount: I use this + a tablet for my home control panels
Nanoleaf lines: among my favorite more exotic lighting choices. possible to make them look very good if you have taste. possible to do the opposite if you don’t
Mini fridge: they’re cheap and the best way to separate drink types, I usually use them as ‘guest fridges’
Shoe rack: useful for shoes, especially if you host many guests
Airpods pro: great for airplanes. reminder apple products are often cheaper on amazon and you can also get 5% back via amazon’s card
DJI drones: surprisingly great for the price. HD footage from thousands of feet away from you!
Blackout curtains: (with a separate rod) are among the easiest ways to fully blackout a room
Curtain rod: use with blackout curtains, no installation or holes required
Under-door extension: I prefer to 100% blackout my bedroom, including sunlight from under doors
Kai nail clippers: Japanese nail clippers which are far superior to any others I’ve tried. Far better clipping results + usage, and never leaves a mess (any leftover waste remains within the clipper).
Enovid / Nowonder: Reduces the chance you get sick if you are attending highly congested events. Nowonder (previously Enovid) is a nitric oxide nasal spray. Amazon link included but the price is over double, I would suggest using the Nowonder link
HiccAway: Gets rid of hiccups. Some people find this really useful (apparently hiccups are painful and bad for some people. this is the only item on this page I haven’t tried myself)
Darn Tough socks: These are the best socks I have purchased for medium to heavy usage. Worth the price!
Bombas: These socks are also among the best one can find, slimmer and easier for casual wear.
Replacement wheels for office chairs: Probably the best $20 and two minutes I’ve spent on anything related to a chair or an office. If you want to glide around smoothly for the rest of your life, these fit in almost all office chairs and require no tools to replace. Thank you Grant Slatton!
Tungsten cube: Great for using as a doorstop or paper weight – best purchase of this post!
Other categories
There’s many categories of items I haven’t included here: software, apps, browser extensions, electrical engineering hardware, 3d printing, collectables, anime merch, etc. I may make separate posts for some categories but I thought it’d be better to post something rather than nothing for now.
If you found this post helpful you may also enjoy my short personal finance post. I need one more Robinhood Gold(card) referral please $5 thank you!
Parting tips
A few tips for thinking about this kind of stuff which may seem super obvious but I found useful:
Any time you have a problem, search for a solution. This sounds obvious, but it took me a long time to do for many obscure problems like “how do I stop sunlight from entering from under my door at 6AM in an aesthetic way”. With how good genAI is, there’s no excuse to not do this anymore. There are custom items for almost any problem now, and if there aren’t, it’s easy to have them made. Having items custom-printed, custom-welded, custom-cut, etc, is surprisingly cheap regardless of the medium.
Almost everything is really cheap. Sometimes I would hang onto an inferior version of an item I happened to already have rather than throw it out and buy a new one. Most of my Amazon purchases are $5-25, and I’ve never regretted buying a better version of something, especially if it’s related to my main workflows or sleep. It felt weird for me to get rid of my ‘like-new’ monitors and desks, but after I replaced them with better versions I wished I had done it years ago. If you buy from not-Amazon you can save even more!
Be pro-active about modifying your environment. The extent you can drastically improve your environment for little effort and money always surprises me if you find and make the right choices. If you have a bad landlord ymmv, but drilling more holes, moving around doors, and so on, has always been worth it for me.
Actually put effort into organization and aesthetics. This may be controversial among some readers, but so be it – this is a post by me for others similar to me, and I under-did cable organization, wall art, closet organizers, etc, for a long time. Maybe one day I’ll do an interior design post!
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