Dell is the biggest seller of laptop and desktop PCs in the U.S. which means a lot of students are making their PC purchases via Dell. Students generally need a laptop for college these days, and indeed they are sometimes required. The good news is that Dell does have a student discount for many colleges in the U.S. We will demonstrate how to get the student discount via Dell.com, but there are other ways to get better discounts which we’ll also cover.

Dell Student Discount

The first thing to be aware of is that Dell only offers academic discounts for higher education purchases, K - 12 is not included. In order to get the Dell discount the first place to start is DellUniversity.com. Once you’re there you have to choose whether you’re a student, student’s parent, alumni or faculty at a higher education institution. You then choose your state and then school in that state. Not all schools are part of the program and each school has their own arrangement with Dell so discounts will vary. In general the discount will be from 5% - 12% off the price of a Dell branded product. When the discount shows up in your cart summary it is referred to as the “EPP Member” discount, which stands for Employee Purchase Program member. It doesn’t mean you’re an employee, it’s really just a bit of marketing to make you think you’re getting a deal similar to what an employee would get.

Dell displays the final discount on a product after you have configured it and priced it out. Below is a screenshot of the discount taken after I configured a Dell Inspiron 1525 to a price of $1,598, the Dell EPP (student discount) knocks the price down to $1,094 total:

When I went through Dell without using the EPP discount (student discount) the same configuration for $1,598 ended up being $1,144 after a normal discount (Dell always shows discounts of course, that’s part of their marketing to make you feel like you’re always getting $$$ off). So do the math and you’ll find that $1,144 (normal discounts) - $1,094 (student discounts) means you’re getting an extra $50 off with the EPP discount, or close to 5%. Not bad, but not great.

No E-Value code available for university store

One problem with the Dell student discount site is that you can’t put in e-value codes to find product deals, Dell often promotes these e-value codes in magazines and online as ways to access products that have good deals going on them. Here’s a link to a page on Dell where you can put in these e-value codes you’ll find:

Dell E-Value Code Entry Form

Unfortunately if you go to that link after accessing Dell via the EPP purchase program link, the typical 5 - 12% discount will not be applied, it is not possible to get that discount on top of an e-value code.

Dell Coupon codes do not work with student discounts

Another marketing tactic Dell uses extensively is posting coupon codes that can be used at checkout to knock the price of a purchase down. Often times Dell will offer 25% off $999+ purchases of Inspiron laptops if you can find and plug-in these codes in the checkout cart. However, if you access Dell.com via the EPP member discount link (student discount) then you’ll see this error pop up if you try to apply a coupon code:

So the reality is that you should try the various methods available of getting discounts on Dell computers and figure out which ends up being the best. Look for coupon codes, e-value code deals and see what the EPP member discount gives you if you apply it. Then just go with whichever deal is best.

And who said shopping is easy? Happy shopping nonetheless!