You Can Get Free Credits to Spend on Amazon Prime Day
Amazon really wants you to buy stuff next week. This year, Prime Day, which is less of a holiday or a sale and more of a collective mass hysteria, will take place on July 12th and 13th, and the mega retailer not only creates the illusion, but lowers prices on thousands of items ( which you probably don’t need ), it also offers free money (in the form of credits that can only be spent on Amazon) in exchange for jumping through some digital hoops. If you buy something anyway without taking advantage of these promotions, you are leaving Amazon money on the table and you should be making as much of their dirty profit as possible.
Below are all the Amazon promotions I could find, along with a bit about how they work and how many credits you can get from them. Warning: Amazon is a large company, so I may have missed some promotions. If so, please leave them in the comments so we can all benefit.
Download and order for the first time with the $5 Amazon shopping app.
This probably won’t apply to you – I know it doesn’t apply to me – but if you’ve somehow never installed the Amazon shopping app or ordered something through your phone before, now is the time. When you install the app for the first time and buy something, you will receive a $5 discount on your next purchase if it is over $10. Here are the conditions .
Free money amount: $5
Complete an Amazon Prime Stampcard for $10.
Amazon ‘s “Prime Stampcard” promotion gives people $10 worth of Amazon credits for completing four Amazon-related tasks — it’s like a scavenger hunt, but more annoying. Your mission, if you choose to accept it, gives you until July 13th:
- Make a Prime Qualifying Purchase
- Broadcasting the show on Prime Video
- Listen to the song on Amazon Music Prime
- Rent an eBook on Prime Reading
You’ll need to download the free Kindle app to borrow the book (if you don’t have a Kindle) and subscribe to Amazon Music Prime to listen to the song, but if you cancel your music subscription before the free week is up, it won’t cost you anything.
Free money amount: $15
Take advantage of Prime Day promotions for $42 (give or take)
Along with deals that don’t last long, Amazon is offering urgent free credit promotions for Prime Day . There’s a total of $42 available right now if you do things like buy an Elvis movie ticket or check out with Amazon Affirm on Prime Day, but look for promotions that will add and subtract as Prime Day approaches. However, you can also take advantage of a potential $2 reward just for clicking this link to Amazon’s “Verify” page .
Amount of free money: $57
Choose non-rush shipping for $1.50 per order.
When checking out after making a qualifying purchase shipped through Amazon Prime, you can save $1.50 by choosing the no rush option. This credit will either be applied to your current purchase or will show up as a credit on your account.
Amount of free money: $58.50
Join the Amazon Buyers Panel for $10/month.
If you don’t mind sharing the details of your non-Amazon purchases with Amazon, you can join the company’s Shopper Panel program and earn $10 each month. Amazon says it’s “invitation only” and requires 10 retail receipts per month to be scanned and uploaded to the company, so if you want to do a bit of work to help Amazon do market research, go for it. (I suggest you confuse the system by only submitting receipts for butt plugs and hair extensions.) If you weren’t invited, you can download the app ( iOS , Google Play ) and wait to be selected. In the meantime, start buying anal plugs.
Amount of free money: $68.50
Reload $10 Amazon Gift Card.
Eligible Amazon users can earn $10 for a “reload” of at least $100 on an Amazon gift card . Amazon doesn’t make it easy (or seems possible) to know who’s eligible before you check, but if you’re logged into Amazon and click this link , you’ll have your decision. (Unfortunately, I am not eligible.)
Amazon often offers credit for buying gift cards (which you can send to yourself) and entering certain promo codes, but the codes only seem to work for a limited period of time, and it’s not clear which codes are relevant. The Amazon is a mysterious and fickle god.
Amount of free money: $78.50
Premium Membership Discounted for Students and Others
An Amazon Prime membership gives you free shipping on many Amazon items and access to a huge selection of Prime Video movies and TV shows for $14.99 a month or $139 a year (only worth the selection of mid -1960s Beach Party movies.) But if you’re an eligible student or receiving EBT or other government benefits, Prime will only cost you $7.49 or $6.99 respectively. Be sure to take advantage if you qualify, although we don’t count this in the calculation.
Total Potential Free Amazon Credits: $78.50.
That’s it: if you take advantage of each of the credit promotions here, you can get $78.50 a day of Amazon Prime. But be warned: Amazon offers so many types of “free credit” promotions for a limited period of time. Invite-only statuses and unclear eligibility requirements, it’s hard to say exactly how many of these apply to you, so I apologize if these offers run out between the time this post is posted and the time you read it.