Where to buy some Arduino or Electronics stuff?

I’ve been digging online for the last few weeks/months in order to find some retailers from which I could buy some Arduino related stuff and electronic components in general. Before I introduced it, I have to say that I usually prefer to go to a retail store rather than buying online in order to support the local stores. I appreciate to be able to get what I need within a few hours. So as long as local stores prices are close enough to the online stores, I’m fine with it.

Hoping this will help some of you, here is below a non-exhaustive list of what I found (this is by no means an exhaustive list – I chose to put an emphasis on some interesting online shops). If you feel like I missed some really important shops, let me know!

I have regrouped the shops by geographical regions. Of course you can buy online from any of them wherever you live, but usually regulations (taxes and VAT) make this not a good option for most of us.

USA

If you’re located in the US, you’re in luck. You’ll get access to some really big suppliers, get really good prices and you can easily get free shipping.

• SparkFun Electronics (also called SFE): they have a really huge catalog and you can buy their stuff from many other retailers who import most of their catalog.
• Adafruit
• Ladyada
• RadioShack

Asia

If you’re located in Asia, you should be lucky too. Most of the low-priced electronics components come from there.

• SeeedStudio: they provide many cheap alternatives to SparkFun ones
• DFRobot: they also sell a lot of stuff, usually reselled by other online shops

Europe

• Lextronic: they also have a retail store not far away from Paris; this is my “near-bye” shop. I usually prefer to get there rather than ordering online (a one hour trip from home). They have great prices, resell the most known SparkFun electronics. Their stock is not always great though. And some stuff can’t be bought here.
• Cooking Hacks: linked to Libelium who is part of the XBee/ZigBee alliance; great shop from where to buy XBees! Great option too if you live in Portugal.

Anywhere

• DigiKey
• Mouser Electronics
• RobotShop: this is the online store from which I buy now most of my stuff (when I can’t find it at Lextronic) because they have a huge catalog and resell all SparkFun, SeeedStudio and DFRobot catalogs.
• eBay: you can find almost everything and get cheap Hong Kong stuff although quality varies sometimes…