In an earnings call to investors Amazon has announced that they will be increasing the cost of Amazon prime to $119 ($59 for prime student) on May 11th for new users. Starting June 16, 2018, existing Prime members with an annual membership will renew at a rate of $119/year. Prime Student members with an annual membership will renew at a rate of $59/year. Currently Amazon offers a prime membership for $99 annually. Amazon last raised the price of a prime membership back in 2014 where the price went from $79 to $99. Earlier this year Amazon increased the cost of a monthly prime membership from $10.99 to $12.99 It isn’t clear how discounted memberships (e.g low income/medicaid recipients) will be affected by this change. According to Amazon they have over 100 million prime members world wide, although keep in mind that some international subscriptions are significantly cheaper and effectively provide access to prime video and nothing else.
There are numerous ways to save on an Amazon prime membership. We’d recommend reading our full guide to saving money on Amazon purchases, but currently you can save on prime memberships by doing any of the following:
- Low-income households can pay $5.99 per month
- Amazon: $79 for New Prime Membership with Alexa
- Students can get six months free thanks to Sprint*
- Ibotta offering $20 Amazon gift card
- Topcashback is offering $15 cash back
- Swagbucks is offering $15 Amazon gift card
You can also lock in the $99 pricing by purchasing a gift of prime (these can be purchased with gift cards). You’ll be sent an e-mail to active your membership, if you’re an existing customer and click this link then you receive Amazon gift cards for the price you paid for the gift of prime membership. Click the link after your membership expires and it will enroll you in another year of prime membership. Keep in mind you’ll need to turn off auto-renew for that to work.
Please note this post contains our Amazon affiliate links.
