Methodology

Every fact in this registry carries a source — its kind, where it came from, and the date it was checked. Nothing is inferred without saying so, and nothing shows a price it can’t confirm today.

What each source kind means

brand-store — Read directly from the brand's own storefront (often a public Shopify products.json feed) — the highest-trust source for a product's own facts.
brand-submitted — Submitted by the brand itself, outside its public storefront.
marketplace-feed — A bulk feed from a marketplace. Useful for breadth, weak for live price — measured at only ~30% still resolving after four years.
marketplace-api — A live marketplace API call, checked at request time.
extension — Captured by a reader's browser extension while shopping — a real page, a real moment.
manual — Checked by hand against the issuer's, AMC's or bank's own published page or document (e.g. MITC, AMFI's scheme file).
ocr — Extracted from a scanned or PDF document with OCR, then reviewed.

Refresh cadence

Fact sheet (identity, ingredients, specs) — monthly, or on source change.
Brand-store price — nightly, in the live layer.
Marketplace price — on demand, cached; top products nightly.
Rates, MITC, policy wordings — snapshot plus diff on a schedule.

Domains tracked today

Food & grocery — 12 categories, 70,201 products.
Beauty & personal care — 8 categories, 18,650 products.
Mutual funds — 6 categories, 8,525 products.
Phones, laptops & tablets — 3 categories, 695 products.
Appliances — 5 categories, 602 products.
Insurance — 6 categories, 290 products.
Credit cards — 1 categories, 247 products.
Printers — 2 categories, 116 products.
Routers & networking — 3 categories, 97 products.
Banking & deposits — 1 categories, 76 products.

What each fact means

Every fact we record is defined once, in the open schema, with a note on how to read it and what it tells you when comparing two products. Those notes are below, by category.

Appliances

Announced: The month the maker announced this model, as YYYY-MM. Appliance lines refresh yearly and older stock is sold alongside new, so the date separates them.
Annual energy use (kWh): Electricity the appliance uses in a year under the BEE test conditions. Multiply by your tariff for a running-cost estimate; real use varies with how you set and run it.
BEE star rating: India's Bureau of Energy Efficiency rating, from 1 to 5. More stars means less electricity for the same work, and the running-cost gap over a decade often exceeds the difference in purchase cost. Always read it with the rating year.
Capacity (ton): Cooling capacity in tons. Roughly 1 ton suits a small bedroom of about 100-120 sq ft; undersizing runs the unit constantly, and oversizing cools fast but cycles off before removing humidity.
Capacity (L): Usable volume in litres. For refrigerators this is the gross figure, which counts space the shelves and fittings occupy, so the usable amount is lower.
Capacity (kg): The weight of dry laundry the drum takes. It is measured with cotton; bulky bedding fills the drum long before it reaches this weight.
Colours or finish: The finishes this model is sold in.
Compressor: Whether the motor runs flat out and switches off, or varies its speed. Inverter types hold the temperature steadily and use less electricity over long runs, which is why they dominate higher star ratings.
Connectivity: How the appliance connects to a network and to other devices.
Convertible modes: Whether compartments can be switched between fridge and freezer use, or cooling can be stepped down for a partly filled unit.
Cooling capacity (BTU/hr): Heat removed per hour in BTU. It is the same measure as tons expressed differently, and lets you compare against imported units quoted only in BTU.
Cools up to (°C): The highest outside temperature at which the unit still delivers rated cooling. It matters in Indian summers, where units rated only to 43 °C lose output on the hottest afternoons.
Defrost: How the refrigerator handles ice build-up. Frost free circulates air and never needs manual defrosting but uses slightly more electricity; direct cool is cheaper to buy and run but needs periodic defrosting by hand.
Dimensions: Width x depth x height in millimetres. Check it against doorways and the alcove the appliance must fit, and allow the clearance the maker specifies for ventilation.
Discontinued: True when the maker has stopped producing this model. Spare parts and service support for appliances usually continue for some years after, but availability tightens.
HDMI ports: How many HDMI inputs the set has. Count your devices before buying, and check whether the ports support the version needed for 4K at 120 Hz if you game on a console.
HDMI version: Which HDMI generation the ports support. Only 2.1 carries 4K at 120 Hz, and some sets fit just one 2.1 port among several older ones.
HDR support: Which high dynamic range formats the set can display. Content and set must share a format; without a match the picture falls back to standard range.
Installation included: Whether the maker includes installation. For air conditioners this is a substantial separate cost, and additional copper piping is usually charged extra either way.
ISEER: Indian Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio: cooling delivered per unit of electricity across a season. It is the number the star rating is derived from, and it compares two air conditioners more precisely than stars do.
Model number: The maker's exact model code. Appliance marketing names are reused across capacities and star ratings, so the model number is the only reliable identifier when comparing listings.
Noise (dB): Operating noise in decibels. A difference of 10 dB is heard as roughly twice as loud, so it matters for a bedroom air conditioner or a washing machine in a flat.
Official spec sheet: A link to the maker's own specification page for this exact model. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against, and it outranks any marketplace listing.
Operating system: The smart platform, such as Google TV or Tizen. It decides which apps are available and for how long the set keeps receiving them, which often outlasts the panel itself.
Panel type: How the television makes its picture. OLED lights each pixel separately for true black; QLED and MiniLED are backlit types that get brighter, which suits a sunlit room better.
Phone app control: Whether the appliance can be controlled from the maker's phone app. App support can be withdrawn years later, which removes the feature from a working appliance.
Power input (W): Electricity drawn while running. It decides whether the appliance can run on an inverter or a generator, which the star rating does not tell you.
Refresh rate (Hz): How many times per second the panel updates. 120 Hz makes fast sport and gaming look smoother; most broadcast and streaming content is still delivered at 24-60 Hz.
Refrigerant: The gas the cooling circuit uses. R22 is being phased out under the Montreal Protocol, so servicing it gets harder and dearer; R32 and R290 have far lower global-warming impact.
Resolution: Pixel count of the panel. Read it with screen size and seating distance: 4K is visible on a large screen at close range, and hard to distinguish from Full HD on a small one across a room.
Runs on a home inverter: Whether the appliance can be powered from a domestic battery inverter during a cut. High-draw appliances often cannot without a large inverter.
Spec sheet version: Which revision of the maker's spec page these facts were read from, as a date or version. Makers quietly edit spec pages after launch, so this records which wording was in front of us.
Spin speed (rpm): How fast the drum spins to wring out water. Higher speeds leave laundry drier and cut drying time, but are harder on delicate fabrics.
Stabiliser-free operation: Whether the unit tolerates voltage swings without an external stabiliser, and across what range. It removes a real extra cost where supply is unstable.
Star rating year: The year the star rating was issued. BEE revises its thresholds periodically, so a 5-star from 2018 can be worse than a 3-star issued today. Without this year the star count alone can mislead.
Warranty: What the maker covers and for how long, usually split between the whole appliance and its most expensive part. Compressor and motor warranties often run far longer than the general one, and that gap is the fact worth reading.
Wash programmes: How many preset cycles the machine offers. Beyond a handful the extras are often variations, so the specific programmes you need matter more than the count.

Headphones & earphones

Adjustable EQ: Whether the sound balance can be changed, usually through the companion app. Some models offer only fixed presets rather than full control.
Announced: The month the maker announced this model, as YYYY-MM. Audio models are often refreshed quietly, and this separates a current unit from last year's stock.
Battery life (hours): Playback time on one charge, as quoted by the maker. Makers usually measure with noise cancellation off and at moderate volume, so real figures run lower.
Battery, earbuds (hours): Playback time from the earbuds alone before returning them to the case. This is the figure that decides whether they last a long flight or a full workday.
Battery, with case (hours): Total listening time including recharges from the case. It is the headline number makers advertise, but the earbuds' own runtime is what limits a single session.
Bluetooth: The Bluetooth version. Later versions improve range and power use, but the phone has to support the same version for the benefit to apply.
Bluetooth codecs: How audio is compressed over Bluetooth. Both the phone and the headphone must support a codec for it to be used; otherwise both fall back to SBC, the basic one. iPhones use AAC and never LDAC.
Call noise reduction: Whether extra microphones reduce background noise for the person on the other end of a call. This is separate from noise cancellation, which only affects what you hear.
Colours: The finishes this model is sold in.
Companion app: Whether a maker's app exists to change the tuning, remap controls or update the firmware. Without one, the model is fixed as it shipped.
Connector: The plug fitted to a wired model. A phone without a headphone socket needs a USB-C or Lightning model, or an adapter.
Controls: How you change track or volume. Physical buttons are harder to trigger by accident than touch panels, which can respond to rain or to adjusting the fit.
Driver size (mm): The diameter of the speaker inside each earpiece. A larger driver can move more air, which usually helps bass, but tuning and housing design affect the sound at least as much as size does.
Driver type: The technology that makes the sound. Dynamic drivers are the common single-driver design with strong bass; balanced armature units are smaller and more precise in the mids and treble; hybrids combine both to cover each range.
Ear tip sizes included: Which tip sizes come in the box. Fit determines both seal and how well noise cancellation works, so the range of included sizes matters more than it appears.
Fast charge: How much playback a short top-up gives, such as 10 minutes for 2 hours. It is the figure that matters when you have forgotten to charge before leaving.
Folds for storage: Whether the headband or cups fold to pack smaller. It decides whether the model fits in a bag rather than needing a dedicated case.
Form factor: The physical style, which decides fit, isolation and battery. Over-ear cups block more noise passively than in-ear tips; open-ear designs deliberately let outside sound through.
Frequency response: The range of pitches the earphone reproduces, such as 20 Hz - 20 kHz. Nearly every model quotes roughly the range of human hearing, so it rarely distinguishes two products and says nothing about tuning.
Hi-Res Audio certified: Whether the Japan Audio Society has certified the model for high-resolution playback. Over Bluetooth this requires a matching codec such as LDAC, and the certification covers capability rather than tuning quality.
Impedance (Ω): Electrical resistance in ohms. Above roughly 100 ohms, a phone or laptop may not drive the headphone loudly enough without a separate amplifier; low-impedance models run fine from anything.
Microphone: Whether the model has a microphone for calls and voice assistants.
Model number: The maker's own model code. Regional variants of the same marketing name can differ in codec support, so the model number is the reliable identifier.
Multipoint pairing: Whether the model can hold connections to two devices at once, so a call on the phone interrupts music from the laptop without re-pairing.
Noise cancellation: How the model handles outside noise. Passive isolation is just the physical seal; active cancellation uses microphones to counter low steady sound like engines and fans, and works far better on that than on speech.
None — No deliberate noise control.
Passive only — Blocks sound by physical seal alone, with no electronics.
ANC — Active cancellation using microphones, typically outward-facing only.
Hybrid ANC — Microphones both outside and inside the ear, cancelling a wider range more accurately.
Adaptive ANC — Hybrid cancellation that adjusts continuously to the surrounding noise and the fit in your ear.
Official spec sheet: A link to the maker's own specification page for this exact model. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against, and it outranks any marketplace listing.
Sensitivity (dB): How loud the headphone plays for a given amount of power. Higher sensitivity means more volume from the same source, which matters when pairing with a phone rather than an amplifier.
Spatial audio: Whether the model can place sound in a simulated 3D space, sometimes tracking head movement. It usually needs the maker's own phone or app to work.
Spec sheet version: Which revision of the maker's spec page these facts were read from, as a date or version. Makers quietly edit spec pages after launch, so this records which wording was in front of us.
Stated noise reduction (dB): How much noise the maker claims the cancellation removes, in decibels. Every maker measures this differently, so treat it as the maker's own claim rather than a figure comparable across brands.
Stated range (m): The wireless range the maker quotes, measured with nothing in the way. Walls and bodies cut it substantially in practice.
Transparency mode: Whether the model can pipe outside sound in deliberately, so you can hear traffic or an announcement without removing the earphones.
Voice assistants: Which assistants can be summoned directly. Most models pass through whatever the connected phone uses, so this matters mainly for wake-word support.
Water and dust resistance: Sealing against dust and water. IPX4 handles sweat and light rain, which is the practical bar for exercise; IP67 and above survive brief immersion. Cases are often rated separately from the earbuds.
Wear detection: Whether the model pauses automatically when removed from the ear and resumes when put back.
Wired listening: Whether the model can be used with a cable when the battery is flat or when Bluetooth is not allowed, such as on some aircraft entertainment systems.
Wireless charging case: Whether the case can charge on a wireless pad rather than only by cable.

Banking & deposits

80C tax-saving deposit: Whether the deposit qualifies for a deduction under Section 80C. These carry a mandatory five-year lock-in and cannot be broken early or borrowed against.
Accident cover condition: What keeps the bundled insurance active, typically at least one transaction in the preceding 30 to 90 days. Without meeting it the cover lapses quietly.
Annual fee (₹): The yearly fee for the card, before GST.
Auto-renewal available: Whether the deposit renews automatically at maturity. Auto-renewal happens at the rate prevailing then, which may be well below the original one.
Branches: How many branches the institution operates. It matters for cash handling and for anything a digital channel cannot resolve.
Card fee terms: Conditions under which the card fee is waived, such as a minimum balance or spend.
Compounding: How often interest is added to the principal so that it starts earning interest itself. Quarterly compounding yields more than annual at the same headline rate, which is why the effective yield differs from the stated one.
Daily ATM withdrawal limit (₹): The most that can be withdrawn from an ATM in a day with this card.
Daily POS / online limit (₹): The daily ceiling on card payments at shops and online. It is separate from the ATM limit and can usually be adjusted in the bank's app.
Deposit insurance: The single most material fact about a deposit and the one most often buried. DICGC insurance covers up to ₹5 lakh per depositor per bank, across all your accounts at that bank combined, not per account.
Domestic lounge visits per year: Airport lounge visits included within India, usually per quarter and often conditional on spending.
Fee per transaction beyond the free limit (₹): What each ATM transaction costs once the free ones are used up, before GST.
Forex markup (%): The percentage added to transactions in a foreign currency, on top of the network's rate. GST applies on top of this markup.
Free ATM transactions per month: How many free ATM transactions the bank's own machines allow each month. RBI sets a floor; banks often give more at their own ATMs than at others.
Free cheque book: Whether a cheque book is issued free, and how many leaves. Still needed for some deposits, rental agreements and loan mandates.
Free transactions at other banks' ATMs: How many free transactions are allowed at other banks' ATMs each month. This is the limit most people actually hit, and the count usually includes balance enquiries.
Higher rate for senior citizens: The extra rate offered to senior citizens, normally quoted in basis points above the standard rate. Age proof is required at booking.
How the rate is set: How the institution determines and revises the rate, and whether it is fixed for the term. The rate itself moves and lives in the service; this records the mechanism, which does not.
Institution type: What kind of institution holds the money: a scheduled commercial bank, a small finance bank, a co-operative bank or an NBFC. It decides which RBI rules apply and, critically, whether deposit insurance covers you at all.
Interest payout: How often interest is paid out rather than reinvested. A payout option gives regular income but forgoes compounding, so it yields less overall than a cumulative deposit at the same rate.
Issue / replacement fee (₹): The one-time charge for issuing the card, before GST.
Loan against deposit: Whether the deposit can be pledged for a loan or overdraft, typically up to 90% of its value. It is a way to access funds without breaking the deposit and losing its rate.
Lounge access condition: The spend or balance condition attached to lounge access. Unconditional access is uncommon.
Maximum tenure (days): The longest term available. Locking in for longer fixes the rate for that period, which cuts both ways depending on where rates move next.
Minimum balance (₹): The average balance the account must hold to avoid a penalty. Most banks calculate it as a monthly or quarterly average, so a single low day is not necessarily a breach, and the shortfall penalty is usually proportional.
Minimum deposit (₹): The smallest amount the deposit can be opened with.
Minimum tenure (days): The shortest term the deposit can be booked for. Rates usually step up at tenure boundaries, so a few extra days can move you into a materially different bracket.
Network: The payment network the card runs on, which decides where it is accepted and whether it works abroad.
Online nomination: Whether a nominee can be registered digitally. Registering one is what spares a family a lengthy claim process later.
Opened digitally: Whether the product can be opened entirely online without a branch visit.
Personal accident cover (₹): The personal accident insurance amount bundled with the card. It usually requires recent card activity to stay in force, which the next field records.
Premature withdrawal allowed: Whether the deposit can be broken before maturity. Non-callable deposits usually pay slightly more but the money is genuinely locked until the term ends.
Premature withdrawal penalty: What withdrawing early costs, usually a reduction in the rate rather than a flat fee. The rate typically drops to the one applicable for the period actually held, minus a penalty.
Purchase protection (₹): Cover for items bought with the card against theft or damage, for a limited window after purchase.
Requires an account with the bank: Whether holding an account with the institution is a precondition for this product.
Schedule of charges: A link to the bank's official schedule of charges, the authoritative source for every fee recorded here.
Schedule of charges version: Which version of the schedule of charges these facts were read from. Banks revise fees with notice, so this records which document was in front of us.
Sweep-in facility: Whether surplus balance moves automatically into a fixed deposit and back when needed. It earns deposit rates on idle money without locking it up, though breaking the sweep may carry the usual premature penalty.
TDS deducted: Whether tax is deducted at source on the interest. Banks deduct once interest crosses the annual threshold unless Form 15G or 15H is submitted; the tax is still owed either way, this only changes when it is collected.
Transfer charges: What outward transfers cost. NEFT and RTGS through digital channels are free by RBI direction for savings accounts; IMPS and branch-initiated transfers may still carry a fee.
Variant: The card variant the bank places this in, using the bank's own naming. Higher variants carry larger limits and fees.

Beauty & personal care

Alcohol: Which alcohols are present. Fatty alcohols such as cetyl and stearyl are moisturising and unrelated to the drying denatured alcohol that appears high on some quick-drying formulas.
Broad spectrum: Whether the product is tested to protect against both UVA and UVB rather than UVB alone. Without it, a high SPF still leaves UVA exposure.
Certifications: Independent certifications the product carries, such as Ecocert or COSMOS. Unlike pack claims, these are audited against a published standard.
Claims: Claims printed on the pack, such as fragrance-free or non-comedogenic. Most are unregulated in India and self-declared, so they record what the brand states rather than an independent test. 'Fragrance-free' is the one with a testable meaning in the ingredient list.
Coverage: How much the product conceals what is underneath. Buildable means thin layers can be added, so the same product can serve as light or full coverage.
Cruelty-free certification: Which body certifies the no-animal-testing claim, such as Leaping Bunny or PETA. An uncertified claim on the pack is self-declared.
Dermatologically tested: Whether a dermatologist supervised a skin-tolerance test. It records that testing happened, not that the product passed any particular threshold, since the phrase has no legal definition in India.
Filter type: How the sunscreen blocks UV. Mineral filters sit on the skin and work immediately but can leave a white cast; chemical filters absorb UV, are lighter to wear, and need about 15 minutes to become effective.
Chemical — Organic filters that absorb UV and convert it to heat. Cosmetically lighter; needs time to activate.
Mineral — Zinc oxide or titanium dioxide sitting on the skin. Works on application; can leave a white cast.
Hybrid — Both types combined, to balance cosmetic feel against immediate protection.
Fragrance: Whether scent has been added. 'Unscented' can still contain a masking fragrance to hide a base smell, which is different from fragrance-free and matters for reactive skin.
Free from: Ingredient groups the brand states are absent, such as parabens or sulphates. These are marketing claims about exclusion, not safety findings, and an excluded ingredient is always replaced by something else.
Ingredients recorded in declared order: Whether the ingredient list is in the required descending order of quantity. When it is, the position of an ingredient tells you roughly how much is present; when it is not, the list says only what is in the product, not how much.
Key actives: The ingredients doing the stated work, such as niacinamide or salicylic acid. Concentration decides the effect as much as presence does, and Indian labels rarely state it, so treat a long actives list as a claim about intent rather than strength.
Marketed by: The company legally responsible for the product in India, which is often not the maker. It is the entity to approach with a complaint, and it is required on the pack.
MRP (₹): Maximum retail price printed on the pack, in rupees. It is the manufacturer's ceiling, not what anyone sells at — most shops sell below it. Never filled when the listing showed 0 (out of stock) or for a retailer-made combo.
MRP read on: The date the MRP was read, as YYYY-MM-DD. Brands revise MRP, so the figure is only as current as this date.
Net quantity: As printed on the pack. Kept as text because packs say '2 x 75 g', and that is information.
Non-comedogenic tested: Whether the product has been tested for pore-blocking rather than only labelled non-comedogenic. The term is unregulated, so the distinction between tested and asserted is the whole information.
Notable ingredients: Ingredients worth naming beyond the actives, such as ceramides or occlusives. Position in the full list indicates roughly how much is present when the list is in declared order.
Official product page: A link to the brand's own page for this exact product. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against, and it is where the full ingredient list is usually published.
PA rating: Protection against UVA, the rays that drive ageing and pigmentation rather than burning. Graded from PA+ to PA++++ under the Japanese standard. A sunscreen with high SPF but low PA leaves a real gap, which is why both belong on the label.
PA+ — Some UVA protection: roughly 2 to 4 times the wearer's own tolerance.
PA++ — Moderate UVA protection: roughly 4 to 8 times.
PA+++ — High UVA protection: roughly 8 to 16 times.
PA++++ — Very high UVA protection: 16 times or more.
Page version: Which revision of the brand's page these facts were read from, as a date. Brands reformulate without renaming, so this records which version was in front of us.
Period after opening (months): How many months the product stays good once opened, shown on the pack as a jar symbol with a number. It runs from first use and is usually much shorter than the unopened shelf life.
pH: How acidic the formula is. It decides whether some actives work at all: vitamin C as ascorbic acid needs a low pH, while a cleanser far above skin's own pH of about 5 can leave it tight.
Serving size: Present on some Open Beauty Facts records; kept as stated.
Shade family: Roughly where the shade sits on the depth range, so shades can be compared across brands that use their own naming.
Shelf life: How long the product lasts unopened from manufacture. Read it with the period after opening, which takes over once the seal is broken.
Skin type: The skin types the maker says the product suits. It is the maker's own claim, not a clinical finding, and 'all skin types' on a strong active is worth reading with the ingredient list.
SPF: Sun Protection Factor, which measures protection against UVB, the rays that burn. The scale is not linear: SPF 30 blocks about 97% of UVB and SPF 50 about 98%, so the jump from 15 to 30 matters far more than 30 to 50. It says nothing about UVA, which is what PA rates.
SPF in this product: Sun protection built into a colour product. In practice people apply far less makeup than the amount sunscreen testing assumes, so it should be read as a bonus rather than a replacement for sunscreen.
Storage: Conditions the product needs to stay stable, such as away from sunlight. It matters most for vitamin C and retinoids, which degrade in light and heat.
Undertone: The underlying colour cast of a shade. Matching undertone matters more than matching depth for whether a base product looks natural.
UV filters used: The specific filter molecules in the formula. Newer filters such as Tinosorb S and Uvinul A Plus hold up better in sunlight than older ones like Avobenzone used alone, which breaks down within hours unless stabilised.
Vegan: Whether the formula avoids animal-derived ingredients such as beeswax, lanolin or carmine. Separate from cruelty-free, which is about testing rather than contents.
Water resistance (minutes): How long the stated protection survives in water, as tested. Nothing is waterproof: after this period the sunscreen must be reapplied, and towelling removes it sooner.

Credit cards

Add-on card fee (₹): What an additional card for a family member costs each year. Many issuers provide the first one or two free.
Annual fee (₹): The fee charged each year from the second year, before GST. Read it with the spend-based waiver: a fee-bearing card can cost nothing if you reach the threshold and full price if you do not.
Annual fee waived at spend of (₹): The annual spend that gets the annual fee waived. It is the number that decides whether the card is effectively free for you; spends such as rent, fuel or wallet loads are often excluded from counting toward it.
Annual interest rate (%): The yearly interest on carried balances, the same charge as the monthly rate expressed annually. It is the figure comparable with a personal loan.
Base reward rate: How many units are earned per rupee spent on ordinary purchases, before category bonuses. Some spends earn nothing at all, which the MITC lists as exclusions.
Billing cycle (days): How many days each statement period covers. Some issuers let you change the statement date, which can shift a large purchase into a later cycle.
Can link to UPI: Whether the card can be linked to a UPI app for QR payments. In India only RuPay credit cards currently support this, and rewards on UPI spends often differ from card spends.
Card material: What the card is made of. Metal cards usually sit in higher fee tiers and can be harder to replace quickly when lost.
Cash advance fee: What it costs to withdraw cash on the card. Cash withdrawals also attract interest from the day of withdrawal with no interest-free period, which is the part that catches people out.
Co-brand partner: The partner whose brand appears on the card. Rewards are usually concentrated in that partner's ecosystem, which is worth reading against where you actually spend.
Concierge service: Whether the card includes a booking and request service. Availability and quality vary widely between issuers.
Contactless limit (₹): The largest tap payment allowed without entering a PIN. RBI sets the ceiling; issuers may set it lower and usually let you adjust it.
Domestic lounge visits per year: Airport lounge access within India, usually a fixed number of visits per quarter. Access is often conditional on a minimum spend in the previous quarter.
EMI conversion fee: What it costs to convert a purchase into instalments, separate from the interest charged on the EMI itself.
Forex markup (%): The percentage added to every transaction in a foreign currency, on top of the network's exchange rate. On a typical foreign trip it costs more than the annual fee, and GST applies on top of this markup.
Fuel surcharge waiver: Whether the 1% surcharge levied at petrol pumps is refunded, and within what transaction range and monthly cap. The waiver almost always has both a minimum and a maximum transaction size.
Golf benefit: Complimentary golf rounds or lessons per period, typically with a spend condition attached.
Insurance cover: Complimentary insurance the card carries, such as air-accident or purchase protection. Cover is usually conditional on paying for the item or ticket with the card.
Interest rate (per month) (%): The monthly interest on unpaid balances. Multiply by 12 for the annual figure, which typically lands between 36% and 46%; it applies from the transaction date once you carry any balance forward.
Interest-free period: How long purchases go uncharged before payment is due, usually quoted as a range because it depends where in the billing cycle the purchase falls. It disappears entirely once any balance is carried forward.
International lounge visits per year: Lounge access outside India, often through a Priority Pass membership that must be enrolled for separately.
Issuer: The bank or NBFC that actually issues the card and carries the credit risk. A co-branded card is the issuer's product, not the partner's, so the issuer's terms and grievance process apply.
Issuer type: Whether the issuer is a bank, a small finance bank or an NBFC. It determines which RBI rules and which ombudsman scheme cover the card.
Joining fee (₹): The one-time fee charged when the card is issued, before GST. Issuers frequently waive it as an acquisition offer, but the fee in the terms is what applies if the waiver is not in writing.
Late payment fee: The charge for paying after the due date, usually banded by outstanding amount. A late payment also ends the interest-free period on new purchases and is reported to credit bureaus.
Lounge access condition: The spending or membership condition attached to lounge access. Unconditional access is rare, and this is where the actual requirement is recorded.
Milestone benefits: Vouchers or bonus points awarded on reaching a spend threshold in a period. They are worth reading with the threshold, since the benefit is all-or-nothing.
MITC document: A link to the issuer's Most Important Terms and Conditions, the document RBI requires and the authoritative source for every fee here.
MITC version date: Which version of the MITC these facts were read from. Issuers revise fees with notice, so this records exactly which document was in front of us.
Needs an existing account: Whether the card is available only to existing customers of the issuer. Some premium cards are invitation-only on top of this.
Network: The payment network that clears transactions, such as Visa, Mastercard or RuPay. It decides where the card is accepted abroad and which network-level offers apply; RuPay credit cards are the ones that can link to UPI.
Over-limit fee: What is charged if the balance exceeds the credit limit. RBI requires your explicit consent before an issuer allows over-limit spending at all.
Points expiry: How long reward points last before lapsing. Expiring points make an accumulating balance worth less than its face value suggests.
Programme partner: The rewards programme the card feeds, where it differs from the co-brand partner.
Redemption fee (₹): A fee charged each time reward points are redeemed. It reduces the effective value of small redemptions considerably.
Rent payment fee: What is charged for paying rent through the card, typically via a third-party app. Most issuers now levy a flat fee and pay no rewards on these spends.
Reward caps: The monthly or category limits on bonus earning. A benefit without its cap is a marketing claim rather than a fact, so the cap is the part that decides what the card actually returns.
Reward unit: What the card earns, such as points, cashback or miles. The unit alone means nothing without its value per unit and how it can be redeemed.
Stated credit score: The bureau score the issuer publishes as a guideline. It is one input to an approval decision, not a threshold that guarantees one.
Stated minimum income (₹): The minimum annual income the issuer states for eligibility. It is a stated criterion rather than a guarantee, and issuers apply their own credit assessment on top.
Stated value per reward unit (₹): What one reward unit is worth in rupees at redemption. It is what converts a headline earn rate into a real return, and the value usually differs by redemption route.
Tier: The tier the issuer places the card in, such as entry, premium or invite-only, using the issuer's own naming. It signals the fee band and benefit set rather than any assessment by us.
Welcome benefit terms: What the card gives on joining and the conditions attached, such as a first spend within a set number of days. The condition is the fact; the headline value is usually promotional and changes.

Mutual funds

AMFI scheme code: AMFI's numeric code for the scheme, which identifies one specific plan and option combination. It is the key that distinguishes the four variants that share a single marketing name.
Benchmark index: The index the scheme measures itself against, as declared in its offer document. It is the reference the scheme's own reporting must use, which is why it belongs to the scheme's identity rather than its performance.
Can be held in demat: Whether units can sit in a demat account alongside shares, rather than only in the registrar's records.
Exit load terms: The charge for redeeming within a stated period, and how long that period runs. It is a term of the scheme rather than a moving figure, and it is what makes short holding periods costly.
Full scheme name: The scheme's complete registered name including plan and option. Marketing names drop these qualifiers, which is how people end up buying a Regular plan while intending a Direct one.
Fund house: The asset management company running the scheme. Your money is held by a separate trustee and custodian, so the AMC manages but does not hold it.
Fund manager: Who manages the scheme. Not in AMFI's public file and empty on most records here, though it matters for an actively managed scheme because a manager change alters how the mandate is executed in practice.
ISIN (growth / payout): The ISIN for the growth option, the globally unique securities identifier. It is the most reliable way to confirm you are looking at exactly the right plan and option.
ISIN (reinvestment): The ISIN for the IDCW reinvestment option of the same scheme.
Lock-in (months): How long units cannot be redeemed at all. ELSS schemes carry a mandatory three-year lock-in in exchange for the Section 80C deduction; most other open-ended schemes have none.
Management style: Whether the scheme is actively managed or tracks an index. Index schemes follow a rulebook with lower costs; active ones rely on the manager's decisions and charge more for it.
Minimum investment (₹): The smallest lump-sum purchase the scheme accepts from a new investor.
Minimum SIP (₹): The smallest recurring instalment the scheme accepts. It decides whether the scheme is reachable on a small monthly budget.
Option: What happens to the scheme's income. Growth reinvests it so it shows up in the unit value; IDCW pays it out, which is taxable in your hands and reduces the unit value by the amount paid.
Plan: Direct or Regular. Direct plans are bought from the AMC without a distributor and carry a lower expense ratio for the identical portfolio; Regular plans embed a distributor commission. The difference compounds over long holding periods.
Registrar: The registrar and transfer agent that keeps the unit records. It is who you approach for statements and non-financial changes, and it determines which service portal covers this scheme.
Riskometer band: The risk band SEBI requires the scheme to publish, from Low to Very High. It is the AMC's own mandated disclosure, calculated by a prescribed method, and it is reviewed monthly.
Scheme Information Document: A link to the scheme's SID, the SEBI-mandated document that states the mandate, costs and risks. It is the authoritative source for everything recorded here.
Scheme launch date: When the scheme opened. Read it with the sub-category, since schemes launched before SEBI's 2018 recategorisation were mapped into their current category rather than built for it.
Scheme type: Whether the scheme is open ended, close ended or interval. Open ended schemes can be bought and sold on any business day; close ended ones lock the money until maturity and trade only on an exchange, often below value.
SEBI sub-category: The SEBI sub-category, which since 2018 defines what the scheme may hold. It is the only classification that makes two funds genuinely comparable, because it fixes the market-cap or duration mandate rather than leaving it to the scheme's marketing name.
SID version: Which version of the Scheme Information Document these facts were read from. AMCs revise SIDs, so this records which document was in front of us.
SIP frequencies: Which recurring investment intervals the scheme allows.
STP and SWP available: Whether money can be moved in or out in instalments through systematic transfer or withdrawal plans, rather than only as lump sums.
Theme: The sector or theme a thematic scheme is restricted to. A narrower mandate means the scheme cannot diversify away from that theme even when the manager wants to.

Food & grocery

Added sugar per 100 g (g): Sugar added during manufacture, as distinct from sugar naturally in fruit or milk. Where a label separates it, this is the figure dietary guidance actually limits.
Additives (E numbers): Additives listed by their INS number or name, such as INS 330 for citric acid. The number identifies exactly which substance is present, where a category word like 'stabiliser' does not.
Allergens: Allergens the label declares, such as milk, soy, nuts or wheat. Indian rules require declaring major allergens, and 'may contain' warnings cover cross-contamination in the same facility rather than an ingredient.
Artificial colours: Whether synthetic colours are used. Indian labels must declare them, and packs using natural colours instead usually say so explicitly.
Artificial flavours: Whether synthetic flavouring is used. Labels distinguish natural, nature-identical and artificial flavouring substances, which is a legal classification rather than a quality one.
Caffeine: Caffeine content where the pack declares it. It matters for coffee, energy drinks and some teas, and Indian rules cap it in packaged energy drinks.
Calcium per 100 g (mg): Calcium in 100 g, declared on fortified and dairy products.
Calories per serving (kcal): Calories in one serving as the brand defines it. Always check the serving size beside it: comparing two products on this figure alone compares the brands' marketing choices, not the food.
Carbohydrate per 100 g: Total carbohydrate in 100 g, which includes both starch and sugars. Subtract the sugar figure to see how much comes from starch.
Certified organic: Whether the product carries an organic certification such as India Organic or Jaivik Bharat. Uncertified use of the word on packaging is not a controlled claim.
Cholesterol per 100 g (mg): Cholesterol in 100 g. It occurs only in animal-derived ingredients, so a purely plant product declaring zero is stating the obvious rather than a benefit.
Contains palm oil: Whether palm oil is in the product. It is often hidden behind 'vegetable oil' on Indian labels, and it is both high in saturated fat and the ingredient most associated with deforestation.
Date marking: Which date the pack carries. 'Best before' is about quality and food is usually still safe after it; 'use by' and 'expiry date' are about safety and are not the same promise.
Energy per 100 g (kcal): Calories in 100 g, which is the figure that lets you compare two products directly. Packs often headline calories per serving instead, and servings are set by the brand, so a smaller stated serving can make a product look lighter than it is.
Fat per 100 g: Total fat in 100 g. The saturated share below matters more for heart health than the total, and the ingredient list shows which oils were used.
Fibre per 100 g: Dietary fibre in 100 g. It is often absent from Indian labels because declaring it is not mandatory, so a blank means unstated rather than zero.
Fortified: Whether nutrients have been added beyond what the food naturally contains. India's +F logo marks staples fortified under its standards, such as iodised salt or vitamin-fortified oil.
FSSAI licence number: The 14-digit FSSAI licence number of the maker or packer, which is mandatory on Indian packaged food. It identifies who is legally answerable for the product and can be checked on the FSSAI register.
Ingredients recorded in declared order: Whether the ingredient list is in the required descending order of quantity. When it is, an ingredient's position tells you roughly how much is present, which is often more informative than the nutrition panel.
Iron per 100 g (mg): Iron in 100 g, declared mainly on fortified staples and cereals.
Marketed by: The company legally responsible for the product in India, which is often not the maker. It is the entity to approach with a complaint, and it is required on the pack.
Millet based: Whether millets are a principal ingredient. Worth separating from 'multigrain', which can mean a trace of several grains in a mostly refined-wheat product.
MRP (₹): Maximum retail price printed on the pack, in rupees. It is the manufacturer's ceiling, not what anyone sells at — most shops sell below it. Never filled when the listing showed 0 (out of stock) or for a retailer-made combo.
MRP read on: The date the MRP was read, as YYYY-MM-DD. Brands revise MRP (the 2025 GST cuts re-stickered many packs), so the figure is only as current as this date.
Net quantity: As printed on the pack — '45 g', '1 L'. Kept as text because packs say '2 x 75 g' and that is information, not noise.
NOVA processing group: A published classification of how heavily a food is processed, from 1 for unprocessed to 4 for ultra-processed. It is derived from the ingredient list by a defined method, not our judgement, and is recorded with its source.
Official product page: A link to the brand's own page for this exact product. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against, and where the full ingredient declaration is usually published.
Packaging: What the product is packed in. It affects shelf life and whether the pack is recyclable in Indian streams, where multi-layer pouches largely are not.
Page version: Which revision of the brand's page or pack these facts were read from, as a date. Recipes change without a rename, so this records which version was in front of us.
Preservatives: Which preservative class the label declares. India's Class I covers common natural preservatives like salt, sugar and vinegar; Class II covers chemical ones such as sorbates and benzoates, which must be named with their INS number.
Protein per 100 g: Protein in 100 g. Read it against energy: a snack can carry a high protein number and still be mostly fat and refined carbohydrate.
Salt per 100 g (g): Salt in 100 g, which is sodium multiplied by about 2.5. Packs declare one or the other, so this exists to make the two comparable.
Saturated fat per 100 g: Saturated fat in 100 g. Palm oil, coconut oil and dairy fat push this up, and it is the fat figure dietary guidance limits most tightly.
Servings per pack: How many servings the pack contains, by the brand's own serving size. It is what turns a per-serving nutrition panel into a per-pack figure, and small packs are often labelled as more than one serving.
Shelf life: How long the product keeps from manufacture, as stated on the pack. Read it with the storage instruction, since it usually assumes an unopened pack in cool dry conditions.
Sodium per 100 g: Sodium in 100 g. Multiply by 2.5 for the equivalent salt figure, since packs use the two interchangeably and the numbers differ by that factor.
Storage: How the pack says to keep the product, and whether that changes after opening. Many shelf-stable products need refrigeration once opened, which shortens their life considerably.
Sugar per 100 g: All sugars in 100 g, whether added or naturally present. Indian labels rarely separate the two, so fruit-based products show high figures without added sugar; the ingredient list is what distinguishes them.
Trans fat per 100 g (g): Industrially produced trans fat in 100 g. India caps it at 2% of total fat; it comes from partially hydrogenated oils, which appear on labels as vanaspati or hydrogenated vegetable oil.
Veg / non-veg: India's mandatory veg/non-veg mark, shown as a green or brown dot on the pack. 'Contains egg' is legally distinct from non-veg here, and vegan is a stricter claim than veg because it also excludes dairy and honey.
Whole grain content (%): How much of the grain content is whole rather than refined. 'Made with whole grain' on the front of a pack can mean a small fraction, and this is the number that settles it.

Insurance

AYUSH treatment: Whether treatment under Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha or Homeopathy is covered, and up to what limit.
Brochure: A link to the insurer's brochure. Useful for orientation, but it is a summary and the wording overrides it wherever they differ.
Cashless claims: Whether the insurer settles directly with the hospital instead of reimbursing you later. Cashless works only at network hospitals and still needs pre-authorisation.
Claim settlement timeline: The time the insurer states for settling a claim. IRDAI requires settlement within a defined window of receiving the last document, and the wording is where the insurer's own commitment is recorded.
Claims via TPA: Whether a third-party administrator handles claims rather than the insurer directly. It adds a party between you and the insurer, which changes who to contact when a claim stalls.
Co-pay (%): The share of every approved claim you pay yourself. A 20% co-pay on a ₹5 lakh claim is ₹1 lakh from your own pocket, and it applies on top of any deductible.
Co-pay applies when: When the co-pay applies, such as above a certain age or in a higher-tier city. A policy with no co-pay at purchase can acquire one at a stated age.
Conditions covered: How many illnesses a critical illness policy lists. The count is less informative than the list itself, since policies pay only for the exact conditions named and only as defined in the wording.
Cover available up to age: The age at which cover ends. For term life this is the point the policy stops paying, and choosing it against your dependants' needs matters more than choosing the premium.
Day-care procedures covered: How many procedures needing less than 24 hours in hospital are covered. Most modern surgery is day care, so a policy requiring a full-day admission for everything would exclude a great deal.
Deductible (₹): The amount you pay before the policy starts paying. Top-up policies use a large deductible to sit above an existing policy, which is what makes them much cheaper for the same headline cover.
Deductible applies: Whether the deductible applies per claim or once across the policy year. Aggregate is materially better for anyone with several claims in a year, since it is crossed only once.
Disease-wise sub-limits: Caps on specific treatments regardless of the total cover, such as a fixed amount for cataract. A policy with a large sum insured can still pay a small fraction of a bill because of these.
Free-look period (days): How long after receiving the policy you can cancel it for a refund of premium less expenses. IRDAI mandates a minimum, and it is the window to read the wording properly.
Grace period (days): How long after a missed due date the premium can still be paid without losing continuity. Letting it lapse resets the waiting periods you have already served, which is the costly part.
Home treatment: Whether treatment taken at home is covered when hospitalisation was advised but not possible. It is usually tightly conditioned in the wording.
ICU cap: The limit on intensive-care room charges, where it differs from the general room cap. ICU is where a capped policy hurts most, since these are the largest daily charges.
Initial waiting period (days): The period at the start when only accidents are covered, typically 30 days. Illness claims in this window are declined regardless of what the illness is.
Insurer: The company underwriting the policy and paying claims. Distributors and web aggregators sell policies but never carry the risk, so this is the entity whose service and solvency matter.
IRDAI approved: Whether the product is registered with IRDAI. Anything sold as insurance in India must be, so its absence is a signal to check what is actually being sold.
IRDAI UIN: The Unique Identification Number IRDAI assigns to an approved product. This is the identity key for insurance, the equivalent of a barcode: marketing names change and are reused, the UIN does not.
Maternity cover: Whether childbirth expenses are covered at all, before considering the waiting period that applies to them.
Maternity waiting period (months): How long before maternity expenses are covered, often two to four years. It has to be planned for well in advance of needing it.
Maximum entry age: The oldest age at which the policy can be bought. Health cover bought before this age can usually be renewed for life, which is why entry age is worth acting on early.
Minimum entry age: The youngest age the policy can be bought at.
Network hospitals: How many hospitals offer cashless treatment with this insurer. The count matters less than whether the hospitals you would actually use are in it, which the insurer's own list settles.
No-claim bonus: How much the cover increases for each claim-free year, and the ceiling it builds to. Check what happens after a claim: some policies reduce the accumulated bonus rather than simply pausing it.
OPD cover: Whether consultations and tests without admission are covered. Most indemnity policies exclude these, so it is a genuine differentiator where present.
Payout options: How a claim is paid: a lump sum, a monthly income, or a combination. It decides whether a family receives one large amount to manage or a regular replacement income.
Permanent exclusions: What the policy never pays for. Reading these is the only way to know what the cover actually is, and the permanent exclusions IRDAI allows are now standardised across insurers.
Permanent partial disability cover: Permanent partial disablement cover: a percentage of the sum insured for a lasting but partial loss, paid against a schedule in the wording that fixes each injury's share.
Policy term: How long one policy period runs. Multi-year policies fix the premium for that period and usually carry a discount.
Policy type: Whether the policy covers one person or a family under a single sum insured. A family floater shares one amount across everyone, so a single large claim can exhaust the cover for the rest of the year.
Policy wording: A link to the full policy wording, the contract that governs every claim. Brochures summarise and simplify; only the wording decides what is paid.
Policy wording version: Which version of the policy wording these facts were read from. Insurers revise wordings, so this records exactly which contract was in front of us.
Portability: Whether the policy can be moved to another insurer while carrying over the waiting periods already served. IRDAI allows this for health policies at renewal, and it is what stops a switch resetting your cover.
Post-hospitalisation cover (days): How many days of follow-up expenses after discharge are reimbursed, covering medication and review consultations.
Pre-existing disease waiting period (months): How long you must hold the policy before a condition you already had is covered. It is the fact that most often turns a claim down, and it runs from policy start rather than from diagnosis.
Pre-hospitalisation cover (days): How many days of expenses before admission are reimbursed, such as tests and consultations that led to it.
Pre-policy medical check: Whether a medical examination is required before cover starts. Where it is not, undisclosed conditions are more likely to surface as a dispute at claim time instead.
Premium payment terms: How long premiums are paid for, which can be shorter than the cover period. Limited-pay policies finish paying early while cover continues.
Renewability: Until what age the policy can be renewed. Lifelong renewability matters most precisely when cover is hardest to buy fresh, which is at older ages.
Restoration of sum insured: Whether the cover refills after it is exhausted within one policy year, and on what terms. Some restore only for an unrelated illness, which is a much narrower promise than it sounds.
Return of premium variant: Whether premiums are returned if you outlive a term policy. This costs substantially more for the same cover, since the insurer holds and returns the money rather than pricing pure protection.
Room rent cap: 'No cap' and '1% of sum insured per day' are wildly different products. A cap silently proportions down the entire claim, not just the room charge, because hospitals price surgery and consultation by room category.
Specific-illness waiting period (months): The wait for named conditions such as hernia, cataract or joint replacement, usually one to four years. These are listed individually in the wording, separate from the pre-existing disease wait.
Sum insured options: The cover amounts the policy can be bought at. It is the ceiling on what the insurer pays in a policy year, before any sub-limits cut it further.
Survival period (days): How long you must live after diagnosis for a critical illness claim to be paid, commonly 14 to 30 days. A claim fails if death occurs inside this window, which is what separates critical illness cover from life cover.
Temporary total disability cover: Temporary total disablement cover: a weekly or monthly payment while an injury stops you working entirely, for a capped period.
Wellness benefits: Health check-ups, discounts or reward points the policy includes. These are the features most often revised at renewal, unlike the cover terms.
Zone-based pricing: Whether the premium and co-pay depend on the city you live in. Moving from a smaller city to a metro can raise the premium or add a co-pay at renewal.

Routers & networking

Announced: The month the maker announced this model, as YYYY-MM. Router model names are reused across revisions, so the date separates a current unit from an older one.
Antenna type: Whether the aerials are hidden inside or stick out. Detachable ones can be replaced with higher-gain versions; internal ones look tidier and usually cover slightly less.
Automatic firmware updates: Whether the router installs its own security updates. Routers are rarely checked by hand, so automatic updates are the main thing keeping a home network patched.
Backhaul: How mesh units talk to each other. Sharing a band with your devices roughly halves throughput at each hop; a dedicated band or a cable avoids that penalty.
Bands: How many radio bands the unit runs. 2.4 GHz travels furthest and through walls; 5 GHz and 6 GHz are faster but shorter range. Extra bands mostly help by giving mesh units a private channel to talk to each other.
Built-in VPN server: Whether the router can host a VPN so you can reach your home network from outside. Separate from a VPN client, which routes your traffic out through a provider.
Cellular standard: Which mobile generation the built-in modem supports, when the unit has a SIM slot. Check it against the bands your operator uses locally.
Dimensions: Height x width x depth in millimetres. Worth checking against the shelf or cabinet the unit has to sit in, since tall antennas need clearance.
Discontinued: True when the maker has stopped producing this model. A discontinued router is closer to the end of its firmware and security-update life than its listing suggests.
Guest network: Whether the router can run a separate network for visitors that cannot reach your own devices.
LAN port speed: A Wi-Fi 6 router with 100 Mbps ports cannot deliver a 300 Mbps connection over cable. This is the most common mismatch in the category.
Link aggregation: Whether two wired ports can be combined for more bandwidth to one device, such as a network drive. Both ends must support it.
Memory (MB): The router's working memory. Low memory shows up as slowdowns or reboots when many devices connect at once, rather than as a lower peak speed.
Mesh capable: Whether the unit can join a mesh network with others of the same family to cover a larger area under one network name, instead of creating a separate one.
Model number: The maker's exact model code, including any hardware revision such as v2 or v3. Revisions of the same name can differ in chipset and memory, which changes what third-party firmware will run.
MU-MIMO: Whether the router can talk to several devices at once rather than taking turns rapidly. It helps most in homes with many simultaneous streams.
OFDMA: Whether the router can split a channel among several devices in one transmission. Introduced with Wi-Fi 6, it reduces lag in crowded networks more than it raises peak speed.
Official spec sheet: A link to the maker's own specification page for this exact model and hardware revision. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against.
Parental controls: Whether the router can filter or schedule access per device. Some makers charge a subscription for the useful tiers of this after a trial.
Power draw (W): How much electricity the unit uses. A router runs continuously, so this is a small but permanent addition to a monthly bill.
Processor cores: How many cores the router's own processor has. It matters for features that inspect traffic, such as parental controls or a VPN, which can otherwise cap your speed well below the line rate.
Roaming standards: How smoothly a device hands over between mesh units as you walk around. Without these, phones cling to a distant unit until the signal nearly drops.
SIM slot: Whether the unit takes a mobile SIM to provide or back up the connection. Useful where fixed broadband is unreliable.
Spatial streams: How many independent data streams the radios can send at once. More streams raise the ceiling when devices also support them, which most phones do not beyond two.
Spec sheet version: Which revision of the maker's spec page these facts were read from, as a date or version. Makers quietly edit spec pages after launch, so this records which wording was in front of us.
Speed class: The maker's combined speed label, such as AX3000. It adds together the theoretical maximums of every band, so no single device ever sees that number; use it to rank models within one brand, not as a real-world speed.
Stated coverage (sq ft): The floor area the maker claims the unit covers, measured in open space. Indian walls of brick and concrete cut this heavily, so treat it as an upper bound rather than a promise.
Subscription for full features: Whether some advertised features stop working after a trial unless you pay a recurring fee. This is a recurring cost that the box rarely mentions clearly.
USB version: The speed of the USB ports, used for attached storage or a backup mobile dongle. USB 2.0 is too slow to serve large files from an attached drive at Wi-Fi speeds.
Wall mountable: Whether the unit has fixings to hang on a wall, which usually improves coverage over sitting it low on a shelf.
WAN port: The port that connects to your internet line, and its speed ceiling. A gigabit WAN port caps the whole connection at about 940 Mbps no matter how fast the Wi-Fi is.
Wi-Fi generation: The Wi-Fi generation. Both the router and the device must support a generation to use its speed, and an older laptop connects at its own generation no matter what the router supports.
Wi-Fi 4 (n) — 2009 generation, 2.4 GHz only in most units. Adequate for browsing, slow for large transfers.
Wi-Fi 5 (ac) — Adds the faster, shorter-range 5 GHz band. Still the most common standard in use.
Wi-Fi 6 (ax) — Handles many simultaneous devices far better than Wi-Fi 5, which matters more than raw speed in a busy home.
Wi-Fi 6E — Wi-Fi 6 plus the 6 GHz band, which is uncongested but has shorter range and needs a 6E client device.
Wi-Fi 7 (be) — Adds wider channels and lets a device use several bands at once for lower latency.
WPA3 security: Whether the router supports the current Wi-Fi encryption standard. WPA3 resists offline password guessing in a way WPA2 does not.

Phones, laptops & tablets

3.5 mm jack: Whether the phone has a headphone socket. Without one, wired headphones need a USB-C adapter or a USB-C connector.
5G: Whether the phone supports 5G. In India, check the supported bands too: a 5G phone missing the band your network uses locally will fall back to 4G.
Always-on display: Whether the screen can show a clock and notifications while the phone is idle. On LTPO panels this costs very little battery; on others it costs noticeably more.
Announced: The month the maker announced this model, as YYYY-MM. Two devices with the same chipset can be a year apart in software support, and this is what tells them apart.
Battery (mAh): Battery capacity in milliamp-hours. Compare it only alongside screen size, panel type and chipset efficiency, since a bigger screen at a higher refresh rate drains a larger battery faster.
Battery type: The cell chemistry. Silicon-carbon cells pack more capacity into the same space, which is how recent phones fit larger batteries without getting thicker.
Bluetooth: The Bluetooth version. Later versions add range and lower-power audio, but the headphones have to support the same features for any of it to apply.
Bluetooth audio codecs: How the phone compresses audio sent to wireless headphones. Both ends must support a codec for it to be used, otherwise both fall back to SBC, the basic one.
Build: What the frame and back are made of, such as an aluminium frame with a glass back. Plastic backs survive drops better; glass and metal feel more solid and allow wireless charging.
Charger in the box: Whether a wall charger is included. Many makers now ship a cable only, so hitting the quoted charging speed can mean buying the charger separately.
Colours: The finishes this model is sold in. Some colours are exclusive to one storage tier or one region.
CPU cores: How many processor cores the chip has. Phone chips mix fast cores for demanding work with efficient ones for background tasks, so the count alone does not rank two chips.
Dimensions: Height x width x thickness in millimetres. Worth reading with the weight: two phones of the same screen size can feel very different in the hand.
Discontinued: True when the maker has stopped producing this model. A discontinued phone can still be on sale, but it is closer to the end of its software support window than its listing suggests.
eSIM: Whether the phone supports a digital SIM. An eSIM can be added without a shop visit, and lets a phone hold a travel plan alongside its usual number.
Fingerprint sensor: Where the fingerprint reader sits and how it works. Ultrasonic under-display readers cope better with wet or dry fingers than optical ones, which light up the screen to take a picture of the fingerprint.
Flash: The type of flash fitted. Dual-tone units mix warm and cool LEDs so skin tones look less washed out than under a single LED.
Front camera (MP): Resolution of the selfie camera. Front cameras usually have fixed focus and smaller sensors than the rear main camera.
HDR support: Which high dynamic range video formats the screen can display. Without a matching format, HDR content plays but falls back to standard range, losing the extra highlight detail.
Infrared blaster: Whether the phone can act as a remote control for TVs and air conditioners.
Interface: The maker's software layer on top of Android, such as One UI or HyperOS. It decides the look, the bundled apps and, on some brands, whether the phone shows ads in system apps.
Macro camera (MP): Resolution of the close-up camera. Low-resolution macro cameras of 2 MP are common on cheaper phones and add little that cropping the main camera would not.
Main aperture: How wide the main lens opens, written as f/1.8 or similar. A smaller number lets in more light, which mostly matters after dark.
Main camera (MP): Resolution of the main rear camera in megapixels. On its own it does not predict photo quality: sensor size, aperture and processing matter more, and most high-megapixel phones combine groups of pixels and output a much smaller image by default.
Main sensor size: The physical size of the main sensor, like 1/1.3 inch. A bigger sensor collects more light than a higher megapixel count on a small sensor does, which is why megapixels alone do not predict low-light quality.
Max video: The highest video mode the phone records, such as 4K 60fps or 8K 30fps. Higher modes fill storage quickly and some are unavailable on the front camera.
microSD slot: Whether storage can be extended with a memory card. Cards are much slower than built-in storage, so they suit photos and media rather than apps.
Model number: The maker's own model code, like SM-S928B. Regional variants of the same marketing name often differ in chipset or bands, and the model number is the only reliable way to tell which one a listing is selling.
Network bands: The cellular bands the phone supports. An imported model can miss a band an Indian network relies on, which shows up as poor indoor signal even where coverage is good.
NFC: Whether the phone can make tap-to-pay transactions and read NFC tags. Absent on many budget models even in 2025.
Official spec sheet: A link to the maker's own specification page for this exact model. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against, and it outranks any marketplace listing.
Optical stabilisation: Whether the main camera physically compensates for hand shake. It matters most in low light and for video, where it is the difference between a usable shot and a blurred one.
Optical zoom (x): How far the telephoto lens reaches without cropping, as a multiple of the main lens. Optical zoom keeps full detail; the much larger digital zoom figures makers advertise do not.
Panel type: How the screen makes light. LCD types use a backlight, so black is really dark grey; OLED types light each pixel individually, giving true black and better contrast. LTPO variants can drop their refresh rate to save power.
LCD — Backlit panel. Cheapest to make; blacks look grey and contrast is limited.
IPS LCD — An LCD with wide viewing angles and more accurate colour than plain LCD.
TFT LCD — A basic LCD. Viewing angles and contrast are usually the weakest of the LCD family.
OLED — Each pixel makes its own light, so black pixels are fully off. True black, high contrast.
AMOLED — Samsung's OLED family. Same self-lit behaviour as OLED.
Super AMOLED — AMOLED with the touch layer built into the panel rather than sitting above it.
LTPO AMOLED — AMOLED that can vary its refresh rate down to 1 Hz, cutting battery use on static screens.
LTPO OLED — OLED that can vary its refresh rate down to 1 Hz to save power.
MiniLED — An LCD with thousands of tiny backlight zones, narrowing the contrast gap with OLED.
Peak brightness (nits): How bright the screen can get, in nits, usually quoted as a peak a small part of the screen can hit briefly. This is what decides whether the screen is readable in direct sunlight; makers often quote the peak rather than the full-screen figure.
Peak clock speed (GHz): The top speed of the fastest core. Only comparable between chips of the same generation and family; a newer chip at a lower clock often does more work per cycle.
Pixel density (ppi): Pixels per inch, which is resolution and screen size combined into the number that actually decides sharpness. Around 400 ppi and above, most people stop seeing individual pixels at normal viewing distance.
Process node (nm): How small the chip's transistors are, in nanometres. A smaller number generally means more work per unit of battery, so a 4 nm chip usually runs cooler and longer than a 7 nm one of similar speed.
RAM (GB): Working memory, which decides how many apps stay open in the background instead of reloading when you switch back. Read it with the RAM type and the software: makers advertise 'virtual RAM' borrowed from storage, which is much slower than the real thing.
RAM type: The memory generation. Newer types move data faster and use less power at the same capacity, so 8 GB of LPDDR5X is not the same as 8 GB of LPDDR4X.
Refresh rate (Hz): How many times per second the screen redraws. 120 Hz makes scrolling look smoother than 60 Hz; the trade is battery, which is why panels that can drop back down to 1 Hz exist.
Removable battery: Whether the battery can be swapped without tools. Almost no modern phone allows it, which makes battery health part of the phone's usable life.
Resolution: Pixel count as width x height. Read it with the screen size: the same 1080x2400 is sharp on a 6.1-inch phone and visibly softer on a 6.9-inch one.
Reverse charging: Whether the phone can charge other devices such as earbuds from its own battery, by cable or by laying them on its back.
Satellite positioning: Which satellite systems the phone can use to fix its position. Supporting more of them, including India's NavIC, generally means a faster and steadier fix in cities.
Screen protection: The cover glass, such as Gorilla Glass Victus 2. Newer generations of the same family are more scratch and drop resistant, and a phone with no stated protection usually has plain glass.
Screen-to-body ratio (%): How much of the phone's face is screen. A higher figure means slimmer bezels, so the phone carries a bigger screen in a smaller body.
Security update window (years): How many years the maker commits to security patches. This is the fact that decides how long the phone stays safe to bank on, and it is often shorter than the OS upgrade promise.
Sensors: The sensors fitted. A gyroscope is the one to check if you care about VR or camera stabilisation, and cheaper phones sometimes emulate a compass in software instead of fitting one.
Ships with: The OS version the phone shipped with, such as Android 15. Read it against the update policy: a phone launched two versions behind has already used up part of its support window.
SIM type: Which SIM formats the phone takes. Hybrid slots make you choose between a second SIM and a memory card, and eSIM-only models cannot take a physical SIM at all.
Speakers: How many speakers carry sound. Stereo pairs sound noticeably fuller for video and games; many stereo phones use the earpiece as the second channel, so the two sides are not equally loud.
Spec sheet version: Which revision of the maker's spec page these facts were read from, as a date or version. Makers quietly edit spec pages after launch, so this records which wording was in front of us.
Storage (GB): Built-in space for apps, photos and video, before the operating system takes its share. The usable figure is typically 10-20 GB lower than the number advertised.
Storage type: How fast the built-in storage is. UFS is several times quicker than eMMC, which shows up in app install times, large file copies and how fast a big game loads.
Telephoto camera (MP): Resolution of the dedicated zoom camera. A phone without one crops the main sensor instead, which loses detail as you zoom in.
Ultra-wide camera (MP): Resolution of the wide-angle camera, which fits more into the frame for landscapes and group shots. Ultra-wide sensors are usually smaller than the main one, so they fall behind in low light.
Update policy: How many years of operating-system upgrades the maker commits to. Rarely on a marketplace listing, always on the maker's own page, and together with the security window it decides how long the phone stays safe to use.
USB port: The port and its data speed. All USB-C ports charge, but a USB-C 2.0 port transfers files at a fraction of the speed of a 3.x one, which matters when moving large video files.
Water and dust resistance: Sealing against dust and water, tested to a lab standard. The first digit is dust, the second water: IP67 survives brief immersion, IP54 only handles splashes. Ratings cover fresh water and are not a warranty against liquid damage.
None — No stated sealing. Treat any liquid contact as a risk.
IP52 — Limited dust protection; resists dripping water at a slight angle.
IP53 — Limited dust protection; resists light spray.
IP54 — Limited dust protection; resists splashes from any direction.
IPX4 — No stated dust rating; resists splashes from any direction.
IP64 — Fully dust tight; resists splashes from any direction.
IP65 — Fully dust tight; resists low-pressure water jets.
IP66 — Fully dust tight; resists powerful water jets.
IP67 — Fully dust tight; survives immersion to 1 m for 30 minutes.
IP68 — Fully dust tight; survives immersion beyond 1 m, to the depth the maker states.
IP69 — Fully dust tight; survives high-pressure, high-temperature jets.
Wi-Fi: The Wi-Fi generation. The phone and the router both have to support a generation for its speed to apply, so a Wi-Fi 7 phone on a Wi-Fi 5 router runs at Wi-Fi 5.
Wired charging (W): The fastest wired charging the phone accepts, in watts. Reaching it usually needs the maker's own charger and cable, and the quoted speed applies to the early part of the charge, not the last stretch.
Wireless charging (W): The fastest wireless charging the phone accepts. Wireless charging is slower and warmer than wired at the same wattage, and needs a pad that supports the speed.

Printers

Announced: The month the maker announced this model, as YYYY-MM. Printer lines are long-lived, so the date tells you whether supplies will stay easy to find.
Automatic document feeder: Whether the scanner can pull in a stack of pages by itself instead of one sheet at a time on the glass. Essential for scanning multi-page documents.
Borderless printing: Whether the machine can print to the edge of the sheet without a white margin, which matters for photos.
Cartridge or bottle model: The exact supply codes this machine takes. It is the single most useful fact in the category and almost never on the product listing: supply availability and cost decide the real cost of owning the printer.
Colour printing: Whether the machine prints in colour or black only. A monochrome laser is markedly cheaper to buy and to run when colour is never needed.
Connectivity: How the machine accepts jobs. Wi-Fi Direct lets a phone print without joining your network, which is a separate feature from ordinary Wi-Fi.
Control panel: What the machine shows you. Without a screen, errors and ink levels are only visible from a connected computer or the phone app.
Cost per page (paise) (paise): Derived in the service from the current supply cost and page yield, not stored here, because the supply cost moves. Declared so the field name is fixed.
Dimensions: Width x depth x height in millimetres. Check the depth with the trays extended, which is often much more than the closed figure.
Discontinued: True when the maker has stopped producing this model. It matters more here than in most categories: once a printer is discontinued, its cartridges get scarcer and dearer over the machine's remaining life.
Feeder capacity (sheets): How many sheets the document feeder takes at once.
First page out (s): How long from idle to the first printed sheet. Lasers must warm up; this is what you actually wait for when printing a single page, and it is often the more honest speed figure.
Functions: What the machine does besides print. An all-in-one saves desk space, but a failed print head takes the scanner out of service with it.
Input tray capacity (sheets): How many sheets the main tray holds. A 100-sheet tray needs refilling roughly every half ream, which becomes a chore in a busy office.
Media types: What the machine can print on besides plain paper, such as envelopes, labels, card or photo paper. Heavier media needs a straight paper path, which not every model has.
Model number: The maker's exact model code. Printer families share marketing names across very different machines, and the cartridge that fits depends on this code, not the family name.
Monthly duty cycle (pages): The maximum pages the machine can survive in a month, not a recommendation. Makers also publish a recommended monthly volume that is a fraction of this; running near the duty cycle shortens the machine's life.
Noise (dB): How loud the machine is while printing, in decibels. Worth checking for a printer that shares a room with a desk, since dot matrix and some lasers are markedly louder.
Official spec sheet: A link to the maker's own specification page for this exact model. It is the source a disputed fact here should be checked against, and it is where the supply codes are confirmed.
Output tray capacity (sheets): How many printed sheets stack before they need clearing. A small output tray can jam on long unattended jobs.
Page yield (pages): How many pages one cartridge or bottle set prints, to the ISO standard at 5% coverage. Real documents with images use far more, so treat it as a comparison figure between models rather than a promise.
Power draw, printing (W): Electricity used while printing. Lasers draw far more than inkjets because they heat the fuser, which can matter on an inverter or a small UPS.
Print resolution: Dots per inch, such as 1200 x 1200. Above roughly 600 dpi the difference is hard to see on plain text, and it matters mainly for photos and fine line art.
Print technology: How the machine puts marks on paper, which drives almost everything else about it. Ink tank models refill from bottles and cost the least per page in India; laser is fastest for plain text and does not dry out when idle; cartridge inkjets are cheapest to buy and dearest to run.
Inkjet — Sprays liquid ink from replaceable cartridges. Cheap to buy, expensive per page, and the head can clog if unused for weeks.
Ink tank — Refillable reservoirs filled from bottles. Higher purchase cost, far lower cost per page.
Laser — Fuses toner powder with heat. Fast, sharp text, no drying out, but colour models are expensive.
LED — Works like laser with an LED array instead of a laser. Similar results, often a more compact body.
Thermal — Uses heat-sensitive paper or ribbon. Common for receipts and labels; plain thermal print fades over time.
Dot matrix — Strikes an inked ribbon through a pin head. Slow and noisy, but the only common way to print carbon-copy multi-part forms.
Dye-sublimation — Transfers dye with heat for continuous-tone photos. Used for dedicated photo printers.
Recommended monthly volume: The print volume the maker actually designed the machine for. This is the realistic figure to match against your own usage, unlike the duty cycle.
Scan to network: Whether scans can go straight to email, a shared folder or cloud storage rather than only to a directly connected computer.
Separate colour cartridges: Whether each colour is its own cartridge. With a combined tri-colour unit, running out of one colour means replacing all three.
Spec sheet version: Which revision of the maker's spec page these facts were read from, as a date or version. Makers quietly edit spec pages after launch, so this records which wording was in front of us.
Speed, black (ppm): Pages per minute in black, measured to the ISO test standard. It excludes the wait for the first page, so a short job feels slower than this number suggests.
Speed, colour (ppm): Pages per minute in colour, to the same ISO standard. Inkjets typically drop much further from their black figure than lasers do.
Starter supply yield (pages): How many pages the supplies included in the box will print. Bundled starter cartridges are often a fraction of a full one, so the first replacement comes sooner than expected.
Supply type: What kind of consumable this is. Drum units and maintenance kits are periodic replacements separate from ink or toner, and their cost is easy to overlook when comparing running costs.
Two-sided printing: Whether the machine prints both sides on its own. Manual duplex only means it prompts you to flip the stack, which saves paper but no time.
Two-sided scanning: Whether the feeder can scan both sides without you turning the stack over. Single-pass models do it in one go; others run the stack through twice.
Works without chipped supplies: Whether the machine accepts refills or third-party supplies without a chip check. Chipped models can refuse cheaper alternatives or after-market refills entirely.

Why prices aren’t in this build

Facts are static; prices move. Baking a price into a build that only runs monthly would mean showing a number that’s wrong most of the time it’s read. A page that can’t confirm a price today says so — a data-price-block placeholder, spliced with a real offer by the live layer at request time, or left as “not yet tracked” rather than showing a stale one.