These are the only 3 gadgets I bought when I became a dad — and one's less than $30

I became a new dad a little over a year ago, but I remember the day like it was yesterday. Like all dads, I was excited to welcome my daughter into the world, but I was also worried about her safety…and, a little selfishly, my own sanity for the first few months of her life.

Being a longtime tech journalist, I knew there’d be gadgets out there that could help, and after a bit of digging, I discovered three devices that changed the parenting game for me.

If you want to save yourself a boatload of time and worry, these are the three well-reviewed gadgets I recommend you pick up. Want to beef up your home security now that you have a little one? Don’t miss our guide on the best home security cameras while you’re here.

In a few years’ time, I’m sure my daughter will become an audiophile like her old man, but for the first few months of her life, audio quality isn’t her biggest concern.

That’s good because this $25 portable noise machine isn’t the world’s best-sounding speaker. However, it’s got a 52-hour battery life and can play lullabies, white noise, and a shusher that could put my baby to sleep in under five minutes.

In terms of design, it’s light and small; it’s a little bigger than a deck of cards and weighs less than half a pound. It recharges via USB-C (it comes with a cable in the box if you don’t have one on-hand) and you can set the built-in timer for up to 8 hours if you want it to run overnight.

It’s become such an essential tool in my life that I even bought a second one for my mom’s house when my daughter’s over there.

This formula mixer that’s basically a Keurig for babies

The last thing you want to do as a new parent is to sit by your kitchen sink at 3 o’clock in the morning waiting for the tap to heat up so you can warm a bottle. I did that, and I hated every second of it. Every minute waiting was one less minute I could sleep.

To claw back those extra minutes, I bought a Baby Brezza Advanced Formula Dispenser that essentially functions like a Keurig. You pour your formula into the top of the machine, set how many ounces of liquid you want dispensed, set the temperature you want and hit run. In less than 15 seconds, you have a lukewarm bottle of formula ready to go.

That said, there is a small caveat here that my baby’s nutritionist wants to share — if your little one has very specific calorie requirements like mine does, then you might still need to add the formula to the Baby Brezza’s warm water yourself. That’s because, while you can program a specific calorie count for each bottle (like 24-, 27- or 30-calories per ounce) there’s no guarantee that you’ll get exactly that amount each time. I found it to be pretty accurate, but sometimes powder build-up around the dispenser reduced the amount of formula that made it into the final mix.

These are the only 3 gadgets I bought when I became a dad — and one’s less than $30

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