What is Amazon Prime? Is membership worth the cost? These are valid questions when considering Amazon’s premium service which combines free postage with access to all sorts of tools, services, and discounts. In this guide, we break down the service’s many features, so you can make an informed decision.
If you’re one who frequently shops on Amazon or notices your neighbors receiving a conspicuous number of Amazon deliveries, you may be asking yourself: What is Amazon Prime, and is it truly worth it? The company’s subscription service costs $120 a year — or $13 a month-to-month, due a recent price overhaul — but it offers a multitude of benefits that may offset the price of admission.
Whether you use other Amazon products like the Amazon Fire TV or just like to shop there, here is everything you need to know about Amazon Prime, so that you may make an informed decision about whether to subscribe or continue with more traditional buying and streaming habits.
For frequent Amazon shoppers, the immediate benefit may be the money you save on shipping. Prime members get free two-day shipping on many of the products Amazon sells, as long as you live within the continental United States. Some users also get access to free one-day shipping in certain eligible zip codes, while others have same-day shipping. Prime members also get free two-hour delivery with Prime Now, which delivers daily essentials and groceries and free release-date delivery on eligible pre-order items (more on this below).
Alternatively, if you do not need an item right away, you can score some rewards by not going with the fastest shipping option. With Free “No-Rush” Shipping, you either earn rewards on future purchases or receive discounts immediately, simply for agreeing to receive your order within six business days.
Shipping is not the only way Prime can save its users money, either. Prime members can also get early access to Amazon’s “ lightning deals,” wherein the company offers massive discounts on specific items for a limited time. More specifically, Prime members get 30-minute early access to select lightning deals.
For those who think Black Friday and Cyber Monday are simply not enough, there is Prime Day, Amazon’s yearly festival of sales. On this day, Prime members get access to exclusive deals. Not everyone has a rosy view of Prime Day, but there’s always a chance you’ll find something great at a low cost.
Check out all of our live Prime Day coverage, including our hand-picked deals.
One of the more valuable parts of a Prime membership is access to Amazon’s library of streaming video content. Like Netflix, Prime Video offers an expansive number of shows and movies. In addition to a rotating selection of popular shows and films from third-parties, Amazon also has its own studio, which produces award-winning original content such as Transparent and Catastrophe. You can rent or buy Prime Video titles individually, but get free access to a number of them with a Prime subscription. You can stream them on a variety of devices, including smart TVs, set-top boxes, and consoles, as well as to your mobile device, with some even having the ability to download for offline viewing.
Prime also allows users to stream music, much like Spotify, Apple Music, and Google Play Music. Amazon’s library is robust, and users can stream music from their computers, smartphones, tablets, and even the Amazon Echo family. Amazon’s library of music has more than 2 million songs and the content is ad-free.
Prime also includes a cloud-based service for storing photos, naturally dubbed Prime Photos. In addition to unlimited storage space for photos, users may also store up to 5GB of videos and documents. New search technology also makes it easy to find specific photos using a keyword, allowing you to pinpoint an image based on location, among other factors.
In recent years, game streaming services like Twitch have become one of the hottest trends on the internet. These services allow people to broadcast themselves playing games while others watch and chat, and Twitch has developed a particularly lively community. Now, Amazon Prime members will automatically get access to Twitch Prime. Among the benefits of this service are free items and content for games — Hearthstone players got access to a new Priest character, for example — along with ad-free viewing. If you already have a Twitch account, you just need to link it to your Amazon Prime account to reap the benefits. As an added bonus, you’ll get a free monthly Twitch channel subscription to support your favorite streamer.
If you own a Kindle and subscribe to Prime, you can download one free ebook each month from Amazon’s Kindle Lending Library. The process is like checking out a book from a traditional library, except there’s no due date; simply return your ebook when you feel like it.
Amazon also has the Kindle First program for Prime members. With Kindle First, Prime Members can read one of six unreleased books every month for free. Amazon editors will select the six books each month, and Prime members can read one in advance of the official release date.
If you’re a news junkie, the company has also teamed up with the Washington Post to provide Prime members with a free, six-month trial to the digital version of the newspaper. Like any trial membership, however, Prime members must cancel their subscription after six months if they don’t want to be charged after the trial period ends.
Food delivery services like Postmates are growing increasingly popular, which is probably why Amazon has recently gotten in on the action. Prime Now allows users to order items from local stores or restaurants and have them delivered within the hour. On a similar note, Prime Pantry allows members to purchase groceries and household items and have them shipped together in a pantry box. The pantry box usually comes with a $6 shipping fee, though, users can get free shipping by purchasing at least five qualifying items.
Prime members can also take advantage of Amazon Elements, a curated line of premium and ethically-sourced products that includes everything from supplements and baby wipes. Before purchasing an item from Amazon Elements, Prime members can learn where each ingredient is sourced, why those ingredients were used, and the manufacturer’s location.
