What's an underrated/life changing product that's cheap?

Bidet / washlet. Your life will forever be divided into a time before you had one, and a time after you had one. You may no longer enjoy vacations because of the lack of one.
- After a bidet pick up a water flosser. It’s like a bidet for your teeth, pure hygiene comfort
  
  Or just use either for both tasks, if you're on a budget. My Waterpik bidet is orgasmic.
  
  I cant fucking stand water flossers, the feeling is much worse than regular floss, it kind of tickles in a really annoying way. Besides dentists seem to prefer people use regular floss anyway.
- Unless you vacation in the countless other counties that have them. I am in Vietnam right now and they are everywhere including many public toilets.
- It is disgusting when you realize most people just use toilet paper. It’s just one step above being a barbarian.
- I stick my arse over the edge of the bath and spray with the shower.
- Your life will forever be divided into a time before you had one, and a time after you had one.
  You nailed it, this is exactly how I describe my bidet experience. My father-in-law is a convert and spontaneously began presenting it the same way.
  How did I live before?! Gross!
- I simply do not understand your kinds obsession with walking around with a wet ass...
  
  Virtually all of us use both. Bidet will clean you and TP will dry you.

Reusable zip ties, goddammit! Regular zip ties are useful once in awhile, but the fact that you need to cut them makes them impractical for many applications.
But the reusable ones, which you can fasten and unfasten with equal ease? Holy shit. I use these bad boys ALL. THE. TIME.
For starters, just think about the cords, ropes, cables, and wires in your life. You have a great many of them, and they are probably a mess. ZIP TIES. Wrap an extension cord or laptop charger up in a loop, pinch it together, and zip it up. And that's just for starters.
Sleeping bags? Blankets? Towels? ZIP. TIES. Roll and zip them and they will pack down much smaller than just rolling them alone, and they won't come unrolled, making packing/storing way the hell easier. I can keep going.
Most applications where you might use an elastic band are actually better with Z I P T I E S. Need something squeezed tightly, like the aforementioned sleeping bag? Zip ties ratchet down tighter than an elastic band can. Need something secured gently, like a bag of chips? An elastic will crush your delicate chips, but a zip tie can hold the bag closed with gentle pressure bespoke and delicate. With zip ties, YOU are in control. They last longer and are much more resistant to temperature and sunlight than elastic bands too, so you can use them in the freezer or outdoors or wherever and they will outlive you.
Get yourself or a loved one a bag of 100 for like $5 right now. Hand them out to children on Halloween. Offer them as gifts to friends and acquaintances new and old. They will change your life and theirs. Reusable zip ties.
- I'd like to hire you into our sales team.
- Kidnapping? ZIP. TIES.
- I hate zip ties with a passion. I hate the reusable ones too. My go to is velcro. Get a big roll and cut it to size. Reusable even if you make it too short.
- I own reusable cable ties, and you made me want to go and buy more
  
  YES! I a roll recently to get the cables behind my desk up and away from my feet. (Jerking cables out of their jacks sideways is bad for today's crap hardware.) AND no more rats' nesting.
  (Too bad I never found a desk with a cable gutter along the back. Wud be great for a bunch of heavy audio/midi cables.)
- I'll add that on farms, zip ties have joined baling string and duct tape as essential this is to have on hand to quickly fix whatever broke and hold together new fabrications.
  But, maybe don't give zip ties to children.
- I read this in Billy Mays's voice.
- I've been giving the reusable zip-ties and the Velcro cable ties out, together as presents, for the last few years. It is something I would love to have been given. (Usually with some other present too)
- Are you referring to Velcro cable ties, or are there reusable plastic ones?
  
  Reusable plastic ones! The Velcro kind are neat too, for some applications, but the plastic ones are amazing.
  These are ones I've purchased in the past, although this particular one is bizarrely expensive at the moment. https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0834ZF5SZ
- Yeah OP I'm going to need a good link now.
  
  I've been very happy with these ones, but the price right now is outrageous for some reason. If I was buying more today, I'd look for cheaper.
- If you try hard enough normal ones are reusable too...
- How big do these zip ties get that can hold down a sleeping bag? Must be gargantuan.
  
  That's the neat thing-- For a sleeping bag, you just zip three of them together!
- For those trying to move away from plastic I recommend buying some hemp cord and learning to tie a taut line hitch. It can serve a similar purpose as a zip tie
  Please comment with your favorite knots
  
  That's gonna be bowline and taut line hitch from me, friend! I'm zip ties for life, but they're not gonna hold my hammock up.

If you can't afford fancy kitchen knives, go into your local Chinese food shop, and look for Kiwi Brand knives, made in Thailand
It's what 90% of chefs in Asia use
- The fanciest kitchen knife you need is Victorinox for 30€. That's what 90% of western kitchens use.
  
  Yep, victorinox Fibrox is the best knife you'll get, bonus points if the handle is melted :)
  The difference is that the Kiwi ones are about €5, which was OP's criteria

A rice cooker. If you eat rice a lot, it just makes your life so much easier while also making better rice.
- Do rice cookers make more than just rice?
  
  You can use them to steam vegs or make some gruels.
  Personally I don't bother, but for people who eat rice daily it's a game changer.
  
  You can make ridiculous, impractical, cartoon sized pancakes. Google "rice cooker pancake" and it will have you searching for rice cookers to buy immediately!
  
  I have used a cheapass no-controls except 'on' rice cooker to make a ton of meat and veggie dishes. All in one pot if you are cramped for space or tools.
  Rice on bottom, then veggies, then a chicken breast on top. Season, turn on, forget, come back and eat when it pops.
  The veggies end up a little overdone but using frozen veggies screws with the rice, so I just deal.
- Minus the spring you can accomplish the same thing with a thin bottomed stainless steel pot on the stove. I never liked the non-stick part of rice cookers.
- I disagree with rice cookers, just boil your rice like pasta and strain with mesh. Way less hassle, way less clean up, extremely predictable results - its what all the top-level chefs do and I myself learned this from my buddy, a former Michelin star chef turned comic store owner.
  I completely disagree with having an additional gadget to do what you can do with standard kitchen equipment in a far superior way with just a little bit of care and skill.

Pill organizer. Start when you take just 1 once or twice a day, get used to filling it each week and checking on it until it becomes a routine. It'll keep you from double dosing and save fretting if you remembered to take your meds or not. Then when you're taking multiple pills multiple times a day you'll prep them 1/14th as often, and open<5% the bottles you would be. For a 1 time 3 dollar investment (you can find them with logos for free quite often) save yourself a few minutes a week, hours a year, days of your life.
A cheap digital kitchen scale, never fret with converting oz to grams again, just click the button and it's changed it's units, some even do liquid measurements so long as the liquid is similar density to water. And food cooks more consistently (therefore tastes better) if you use consistent ingredients, and how can you do that if you're using a "more or less" system? Get your accuracy to half a gram really cheap, a tenth of a gram (more than enough for cooking) for not much more.
- I'm baffled that there are many people who don't use a digital kitchen scale
  
  Probably because many American recipes only use cups and spoons as a measurement.
  
  Dials make it easier to visually compare weights.
  And metric makes things so much easier.
- Full agree on the cheap digital kitchen scale. Eyeballing stuff often takes longer than pulling out the kitchen scale and measuring it out.
  I use mine specially when seasoning meats, souring cabbage, making simple breads, and splitting portions to freeze. It's also handy as I'm trying to lose weight, it gives me a way to control how much potato/polenta/rice I'm eating per meal.
  
  I used to hate my digital scales, I used them so infrequently that the batteries would be flat every time I pulled it out.
  This bad boy is a game changer, and it was only a bit more expensive. You just spin the wheel to generate enough power for a few minutes -

This book actually changed my life.
"Discover What You Are Best At" by Linda Gail.
I worked all my life, and always hated every job. Then I read the book and learned that I might be well suited for a position I had never considered. Took a course and did well, passed and applied for a job.
If you can wake up on a snowy Monday and not hate waking up, you've solved most of your problems.
- Just curious at what jmsort of career that ended up being for you
  
  Same
  
  The book comes in two sections. The first part is a series of self administered tests in different areas, and the second part is a list of jobs that use those skills. So, some one with good dexterity and good interpersonal skills might make a good paramedic, or a good hair dresser. Two wildly different jobs, but using the same skills.
- Thank you! I NEEDED this (I might be jumping the gun as I haven't read it yet lol)
  But I'm in this exact situation. I hate myself for my failure to find "who I am" and I just suffer shit job after shit job with absolutely no idea how to figure out what I actually want. I'm pretty much miserable every single day because of it... All I know is what I don't want from my previous experience of shit jobs, but I have no idea how to find what I'm capable of doing.
  
  Good luck.
- Can I ask for additional elaboration?

A white noise machine.
- (I use an FM radio tuned to a spot where there are no signals. Doubles as an FM radio during the day.)
  (Use the tone controls for more or less white or brown noise.)
  
  This would also work as an occasional alarm for me, because there are a lot of pirate radio stations in my part of the world. It would go like: static noise - sudden silence - guy shouting "Hello?! Test one, two!" - horrible music.
- I use one to drown out the outside noise my dog picks up on and barks at in the middle of the night.
  
  I realize you're probably doing it for yourself, but as someone who's had neighbors who don't care that their dog is a noise nuisance, I appreciate you.
- There is Easy Noise on FDroid
  
  Also: Noice on FDroid too.
- For someone uninitiated who enjoys silence, what is the point? What do you use it for?
  
  tinnitus means theres always a fax machine connecting in your silence.
  
  Sleeping usually. I have one that can be adjusted to output various fan noises, or white noise. I find I sleep deeper at night using it.
- We use one and it's an unexpected game changer.
- Tons of great fan sounds on Spotify you might enjoy
  
  I have a white noise machine.

Condoms
- I staple my foreskin closed then add a bit of superglue. Cheap condom. 👍
  
  How do you get the lemonade out when you're thirsty?
- Now a question of philosophical nature - are condoms life changing? I would argue they are life un-changing

A full desk-size mouse pad.
If you work at a desktop it makes a huge difference to overall ergonomics.
Also the squatty potty. Especially if you have a high toilet.
- May I ask why the mouse pad makes a difference? I have a nice smooth desktop so I don't see the use.
  
  forces you to go paperless since its no longer a writing surface.
  
  I thought my desk was smooth too untill I got a mousepad. It also keeps the little feet on the bottom of the mouse from getting worn out as quickly. The effort to start and stop the mouse seems trivial, until you see just how easy it can truly be with a mousepad.
  It also helps keep crap from building up on the mouse skates since the soft mousepad is constantly "sweeping" the bottom of the mouse.
- try a trackball, its hard at first but once you become accustomed to it, the ergonomics is so much better. I personally prefer the thumb ball style that Logitech makes.
  Plus you get to tell people your cleaning your balls again, like the good ol days

It depends on your definition of cheap, but towel warmers. Just pop your towel into a little tub with a heater a few minutes before jumping in the shower. Then it's as warm as if it just came out of the dryer by the time you get out.
Staying at hotels seems so lacking in luxury when you have to dry off with a cold towel.
- We used to live in a house that had a warming towel rack and I feel like my life has been a perpetual downgrade since moving out
  
  Bucket style towel warmers don't require any installation and can be had for $100-$150 (actually I got mine from aldi for like $65). Maybe it's time to restore your previous standard of living?
- Kramer? Is that you?
  
  Did Kramer spend an episode obsessed with warm towels, or is it just my writing style that sounds like him?
- Staying at a hotel lacks in luxury when you are used to bidets as well

A scissors sharpener. You don't know what your scissors can do.
Knife sharpener. Sharp knives are safer. You can also very often buy dull knives for cheap... and make them sharp. I am pretty happy with my 3 stage sharpener.
Costco executive membership. It will pay for itself. Also get the Costco credit card and be sure to use it to buy all your Costco gas.
Spring assist flipper knife with deep pocket clip. Buy a cheap one first and sharpen it...with...your knife sharpener! It is incredibly useful to have a sharp knife in your hand a second after wanting it.
Lemon/lime squeezer. Stop struggling.
Pour over coffee setup.
Coffee grinder. Fresh ground is so much better. I used a manual one for a long time.
Pepper mill.
Bamboo chopsticks. Very cheap. I prefer them to the metal ones I also have because they grip better.
LED headlamps. Get some with red lights to take camping. Keep them all over the house and garage to light dark rooms, corners and outside.
Paper maps. I have the USGS map of my area up on the wall by my back door. I also have many in the door of my truck. Free at state visitor centers or by mail.
- ~~Knife sharpener~~ whetstones are the way to go.
- A knife sharpener is a bad idea generally. They really deepen any defects in the blade. It will make your knives sharper for a bit, but overall those ruin knives and dont sharpen all that well.
  There are some belt powered sharpeners that can in fact do a decent job for the average person.
  A well handsharpened knife will stay sharp A LOT longer than one from a sharpener appliance. It isnt that hard, a skill most people can pick up and a diamond plated sharpening stone from aliexpress will set you back 2-5 bucks only, while being a decent first stone.

Wooden closepins at the dollar store. Use them everywhere.
- *clothes pins

Hot water bottle or equivalent warm thing

Really good, solid cables of varying varieties (preferably braided). I've had many cables for years and never had to replace them (or if I did, it was wayyy after their due date lol). HDMI and Micro USB were the big ones for me
- Anker is always good!

Coffee press, 20€ and you don't have to make an entire pot of coffee without resorting to instant coffee. Also very satisfying to use.
- Like a french press? Or is that a different thing?
  
  I don’t know if this is what they were referring to but Aeropress is great. Been using one for years as a secondary brewer when I don’t need a whole pot and it’s easy to make consistently good coffee without much fuss.

Air fryers!
- That's just a forced air convection oven with less insulation though, right?
  
  And a smaller volume capacity. I finally grabbed an air fryer and we use it most days. I didn’t expect to like or use it so much.
  
  And? I’ll be honest. Want to reheat a thing, especially fast food, this is amazeballs. Want to cook something so it’s crispy on the outside and hot, in 5-10 minutes? This. From the freezer? 15 minutes. Laughed at ‘em then got one as a present. Love it.
  
  It has a better shape and size that allows for the air to flow more efficiently. It really does make things crispier than a normal convection oven.
  
  Less insulation yes, but crucially less volume to heat as well. Overall power consumption is typically less than that of a large oven because of the smaller size.
- They are really not a good cooking tool imo, and to put it in the most forgiving way, good at only a few limited tasks.
  I was given an air fryer against my will, and I'm a great cook that makes everything from scratch. I can say in my experience that it's an occasional time saver, but it's really good at ruining food and making it come out worse than literally any other method of cooking.
  In my very unpopular opinion, there is nothing you can do in an air fryer that you cannot do with standard equipment and have it come out much better.
  I get the convenience, and I get how life-changing they can be for people who don't want to cook, but I don't think they're good for everybody.

desk lamp

If you don’t ride the bus regularly, a 10 trip bus pass.

A box of disposable wooden chopsticks.
Do you ever want to poke something? Unjam your weed pipe? Stir tortilla dough? Scrape some unspeakable crap off the garage floor and then discard the scraping thing? Chopsticks are so insanely useful when you have a jar full of them and you just grab them and use them for any disposable task.
The cheapest are the best because they flex and they are rough. Because of the texture, they are very absorbent. The head of it is square so if you need to have a scraping edge you've got it, and then the tapered tip fits into so many areas. You can snap them in half, jam a wad of paper in the middle for a fulcrum, and using an elastic band on the other end turn them into quick clips
I don't even want to go on and on about all the things I use them for, because this would be the longest Lemmy comment in history.

Magnesium.
For me, 500mg a day is the difference between being functional and successful, and being suicidal.
- Absolutely! It made such a difference in my life being able to sleep through the night! I had gone down the benzos and or weed route making me fall a asleep but not truly resting. Magnesium is now a staple for me.