wait for sale
/weɪt fər seɪl/
CommonChoosing to hold off on buying a game until its price drops noticeably.
Sometimes genuine frugality. Sometimes a polite way of saying you are not that interested. The two are hard to tell apart.
Real-world examples4 examples
| # | Example | What it means | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | wishlisted. gonna wait for it to go on sale. not paying $70 for a 10 hour game | The game's length does not justify the full price. | reddit, 2024 |
| 02 | wait for sale. it'll be $20 by Christmas | Predicting a price drop within a few months of launch. | reddit, 2023 |
| 03 | I have 200 games in my backlog. everything is wait for sale at this point | Not enough time to justify buying anything at full price. | reddit, 2024 |
| 04 | it's been a year and still waiting for it to hit $30. they are holding the price | Frustrated that a game has not dropped in price despite being a year old. | x, 2024 |
Use it when
- A game looks interesting but not worth paying full price for.
- You are wishlisting games to buy during the next major sale.
- Advising someone to hold off on a purchase.
Do not use it when
- You plan to buy the game at launch.Use “day one buy” instead.
- You will never buy the game regardless of price.
Wait for sale vs day one buy
wait for sale
Wait for sale means holding off until the price drops.
VS
day-one-buy
Day one buy means buying at full price on launch day.
Origin and context
Phrase tied closely to the rise of Steam and digital storefront sales culture, particularly Valve's seasonal Steam sales that started around 2010 and trained gamers to wait for price drops.
- First seen
- 2010s
- Confidence
- medium
Cite this page
Use this stable URL to reference the entry.
https://slang.fyi/wait-for-saleUpdated: 2026-08-29License: CC BY 4.0