Amazon Ends Shared Prime Shipping Program

If you’ve been enjoying the perks of free Prime shipping through a friend or family member’s account and you’re not residing together, there’s a change you need to be aware of. Amazon is set to discontinue the Prime Invitee sharing program to encourage more individual subscription signups. The new program taking its place is Amazon Family, offering similar benefits but limited to two adults and four children living at the same address. Unfortunately, this means no more free shipping to multiple addresses.

For those benefiting from someone else’s Prime Invitee perks, you have until October 1st to continue enjoying the current program before the shift occurs. After that date, you’ll need your own Amazon Prime subscription to access free shipping. New subscribers are eligible for a $15 year-long Prime membership, but after that, the monthly rate kicks in at $15.

This modification comes on the heels of reports by Reuters indicating a decline in Prime membership signups despite a successful July Prime Day event. Amazon’s sales soared during this period, but the new Prime subscriptions fell short of internal projections, particularly in comparison to last year’s sign up rates in the US.

With this change, Amazon aims to drive more individual Prime subscriptions by requiring separate households to have their own accounts. This strategy mirrors other companies like Netflix, which have also restricted password sharing among friends and family. Ultimately, Amazon’s move seeks to ramp up Prime account signups by curbing shared subscriptions.