Despite the fact that Covid-19 hit two years ago, almost everything decent is either out of stock or costly as a result of the covid-related disruption in production lines combined with high consumer demand. Unfortunately, you'll have to place a backorder and wait many weeks to months for most scopes. Furthermore, because almost all telescopes have seen considerable price increases (30% to 50% on average) in the last 1-2 years, the price-related groups below may not be as useful as we intended when we first designed them. The last time this page was updated was in January 2022 (Update involved removing many of the discontinued Meade telescopes).
We recommend avoiding Amazon for larger telescopes ($300+) because online US telescope retailers provide superior technical and post-sales assistance, product choice, and pricing, as well as a better guarantee that you'll get what you paid for. Most $300+ telescopes come with two boxes containing the optical tube and base, and Amazon (or some of its third-party merchants) is infamous in the astronomy community for shipping only one of the two boxes occasionally. However, we still love Amazon for everything else, and we'd recommend it for accessories, lower-cost telescopes, and even $300+ telescopes if (and only if) the value and availability are appealing! High Point Scientific, AgenaAstro, Astronomics, and Orion's Telescope.com are all reputable US sellers with good shipping, refund, and financing options, and your shopping experience will be comparable to that of your typical Amazon purchases. Of all the US retailers,
High Point Scientific, the largest internet telescope retailer in the United States, is the community favourite.