After announcing the change in September, Amazon has today confirmed in an email to Prime members that Amazon Prime Video will begin showing ads alongside content unless customers pay an additional fee starting in January 2024.
Amazon Prime Video is a perk of the overall Prime subscription, which is best known for offering free shipping from Amazon. Prime Video has historically offered its library of content without ads, but that will change in about one month.
In an email to customers, Amazon confirms that ads will begin showing on Prime Video starting on January 29, 2024. Previously, Amazon said the change would take place in “early” 2024. Customers can avoid ads by paying an additional $2.99 per month on top of their monthly or yearly Amazon Prime subscription.
Amazon’s email reads in part:
We are writing to you today about an upcoming change to your Prime Video experience. Starting January 29, Prime Video movies and TV shows will include limited advertisements. This will allow us to continue investing in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period of time. We aim to have meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming TV providers. No action is required from you, and there is no change to the current price of your Prime membership.
Top comment by Lee Woods
I wish the FTC would investigate Amazon for making users pay for all the various Prime products when we just want the Prime Shipping.
The email goes on to list the other benefits of Prime, as well as teasing “additional features and programs added in the future.”
As of today, Amazon is also opening up “pre-orders” for the ad-free subscription. Through Amazon’s website, customers can pre-emptively sign up for the $2.99 per month subscription before the change actually takes place.
Amazon Prime currently costs $139 per year when billed annually or $14.99 per month. Prime Video on its own runs $8.99/month.
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