Looking for ways to save on an Amazon Prime membership? You’re not alone. Amazon Prime is one of the most popular subscriptions available with over 150,000,000 paid Prime members, but it’s also quite expensive.
I’ll go over my tips and tricks on how you can get Amazon Prime for free or at a major discount. Do you have your own hack to get an Amazon Prime discount? Share it in the comments below!
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How to Get Amazon Prime for Free
If you’re like me, you love shopping at Amazon and have a Prime membership. It has *almost* everything you need at a touch of a button, but that annual membership fee ain’t cheap. Here’s how you can get it for free (or at a big discount).
How much is Amazon Prime?
Amazon Prime cost $79 per year when the subscription first launched in February of 2005, offering unlimited two-day shipping on over a million items. This was the only benefit available for that initial annual subscription fee.
Fast forward 17 years later, the annual fee is now $119 (and will increase to $139 beginning February 18, 2022), but the list of benefits have also ballooned to include:
- Amazon No Rush Credit – earn credits when you decline two-day shipping for items you don’t need right away
- Prime Video – watch popular movies and TV shows plus exclusive Amazon Originals
- Prime Pantry (discontinued in 2021)
- Amazon Music – listen to 90 million songs ad-free
- Amazon Photos – unlimited free full-resolution photo storage
- Lightning Deals – early access to a limited number of discounts offered on items for a short period
- Amazon Now – stand alone app offering free two-hour delivery and one-hour delivery for $7.99 (select states)
- Amazon Prime Day – annual event that offers exclusive deals on a wide variety of products for 24 hours
- Same-Day Delivery – free same-day delivery on thousands of products and other daily essentials
- Prime Reading – free rotating selection of more than 1,000 books, audiobooks, and magazines
- Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card – exclusive credit card that offers 3% back at Amazon and Whole Foods Market, 2% at restaurants, gas stations and drugstores, and 1% back on all other purchases
- Prime Wardrobe – 7-day “try before you buy” service for fashion and accessories
- Amazon Key – allows delivery of Amazon packages delivered to your garage, home, or car without a key via the Amazon app
- Whole Foods – extra 10% discount off items with yellow sale signs and Prime member-only deals
- Prime Free One Day – one-day shipping with no minimum purchase amount on over 10 million products
- Amazon Fresh – free grocery deliveries in select cities
- Amazon Day – combine multiple orders throughout the week and have it shipped in fewer boxes on a single day of your choice
- Subscribe & Save – unlock 20% savings on subscriptions with five or more products in one monthly delivery
- Prime Gaming (formerly Twitch Prime) – receive free games, exclusive in-game loot, and a free subscription to Twitch.tv
These are amazing benefits. Personally, outside of the two-day shipping, I find myself using Prime Video, Amazon Fresh, and Subscribe & Save the most.
Still, $139 a year is quite a chunk of change. Fortunately, there are ways to cut the annual membership fee way down.
While only a few will qualify to grab Prime for free, many others can get a discount on Prime using one of the methods listed below.
Let’s get started!
2 Ways to Get Amazon Prime for Free
There are two different ways to get Amazon Prime for free. One is available to Amazon customers that want to try Prime while the other is available to all college and university students.
If you’re not eligible for any of the free ways to get Amazon Prime, then check out the next section where I show you how to get Amazon Prime at a discount.
1. Amazon Prime 30-Day Free Trial for Everyone
You can get a free 30-day trial of Prime right now at no cost! It’s worth it for the free two-day shipping alone, but this lets you try out all Prime benefits for an entire month.
Trying out Prime for 30 days will let you see if Prime is worth it or not. You can cancel anytime before the 30-day free trial is up. After your trial, Prime costs $12.99 per month.
2. Amazon Prime 6-Month Free Trial for Students
If you’re currently a college student with an .edu email address, sign up at the Prime Student portal to get six months free of Prime.
Additionally, should you decide to keep your Prime membership after the free trial period, you pay the discounted rate of $6.49 per month. That’s half the normal price of Prime!
3 Ways to Get a Discount on Amazon Prime
If you’re not eligible for any of the previous free ways to get Amazon Prime, then check out this list where I show you how to get an Amazon Prime discount.
1. Lock in Amazon Prime at the Old Price
I mentioned earlier that the price of Amazon Prime will increase to $139 from $119 beginning on February 18, 2022 for new members (the change occurs on March, 25, 2022 for existing Prime members).
However, you can “lock in” at the current $119 price by purchasing a Gift of Prime membership. These never expire and are available at the current annual membership cost, but you can redeem them later when the price of Prime increases!
Set your Prime membership not to auto-renew by canceling the membership on the ‘Manage My Membership‘ page (you won’t lose your current membership). Then after your full-year membership ends, apply a Gift of Prime to your account.
Note that you can only buy one Gift of Prime membership at a time. In order to purchase more, you have to either change the delivery date or send it to a different email address.
I bought five of these when the annual Prime membership was $99 and have been getting a discount on Prime every year ever since 🙂
Ninja Tip: One of the best secrets of Gift of Prime is you have the option to convert them to an Amazon Gift Card. So if you ever decide not to use it for an Amazon Prime membership subscription, you can cash it out to your Amazon balance (or anyone’s Amazon balance).
2. Get Amazon Prime for $5.99 Per Month for EBT
People who are on government assistance and have an EBT card (you’ll need to provide a copy for proof) can get Prime for $5.99 per month. That’s the lowest monthly cost for Prime – it’s even cheaper than the student rate!
Be aware that you’ll need to requalify every 12 months to keep this low rate.
3. Get Amazon For One Month and Cancel
Amazon Prime lets you cancel at any time for any reason. So let’s say you don’t normally shop at Amazon, but there are a couple of items you want to buy during the holidays or you want to take advantage of the sales that happen on Prime Day.
If that’s the case, just sign up for Prime at the $12.99 monthly rate to get everything you need within that month and then immediately cancel.
This option will costs just $12.99 for the single month of use.
The Bottom Line
Hopefully you’re able to use one of the ways listed in this post to save money on your Amazon Prime membership. If you’re able to get Prime for free – even better!
This are just the hacks I know of. Maybe an astute The Money Ninja reader out there is more clever and have a tip or trick of their own. If you do, please share it with us below!
How have you saved on your Amazon Prime membership? What kind of discounts can you get?
