Amazon Says Goodbye to Freevee
Streaming services are finding new ways to ensure we spend more money than ever, such as tightening password sharing policies . But not all streaming services charge huge fees for their content. In fact, there is a decent list of options that are completely free (and legal). Among them is Amazon Freevee, a way to watch shows and movies without worrying about your wallet—at least that’s how it used to be.
On Tuesday, we learned that Amazon plans to shut down Freevee within the next few weeks , a move that may surprise casual fans, but not those who have seen the writing on the wall. The service, as the name suggests, offered users free content accompanied by commercial breaks during shows and movies. But once Amazon started offering an ad-supported Prime Video plan last year , Freevee started to seem a little redundant.
Undoubtedly, the most famous original show on the platform was Jury Duty , a reality show similar to The Truman Show in which one man was tricked into performing his “jury duty” while a court full of actors surrounded the fake trial. However, there were many other Freevee original films, including Alex Rider , Bosch: The Legacy , and Judy Justice (yes, featuring Judge Judy).
However, Freevi was not always Freevi. The service originated within IMDb (a subsidiary of Amazon) under the name IMDb Freedrive in 2019. It was renamed IMDb TV shortly after, but Amazon changed the name again to Freevee in 2022.
Can you still watch Freevi?
The good news is that none of Freevee’s content will disappear. Amazon is simply lumping it into a “Watch Free” category that will be available with or without a Prime membership. This means you can download Prime, jump to any “free” content, and watch it with ads. Right now, this requires scrolling through a sea of blocked content that requires a Prime membership to find, but perhaps Amazon will make this free content more obvious in the coming weeks.