Amazon.com Amazon.com is an e-commerce platform that sells many product lines, including media (
books, movies, music, and software), apparel, baby products,
consumer electronics,
beauty products, gourmet food, groceries, health and personal care products, industrial & scientific supplies, kitchen items,
jewelry, watches, lawn and garden items, musical instruments,
sporting goods, tools, automotive items, toys and games, and farm
supplies and
consulting services. Amazon websites are country-specific (for example, amazon.com for the US and amazon.co.uk for UK) though some offer international shipping. Visits to
amazon.com grew from 615 million annual visitors in 2008, to more than 2 billion per month in 2022. The e-commerce platform is the 12th most visited website in the world. "Rufus" is now available in the US, India and the UK which helps the shoppers get product recommendations, get shopping list advice, compare products and see what other customers have responded to regarding their specific questions. Results generated by Amazon's search engine are partly determined by promotional fees. The company's
localized storefronts, which differ in selection and prices, are differentiated by
top-level domain and
country code:
Merchant partnerships In 2000, US toy retailer
Toys "R" Us entered into a 10-year agreement with Amazon, valued at $50 million per year plus a cut of sales, under which Toys "R" Us would be the exclusive supplier of toys and baby products on the service, and the chain's website would redirect to Amazon's Toys & Games category. In 2004, Toys "R" Us sued Amazon, claiming that because of a perceived lack of variety in Toys "R" Us stock, Amazon had knowingly allowed third-party sellers to offer items on the service in categories that Toys "R" Us had been granted exclusivity. In 2006, a court ruled in favor of Toys "R" Us, giving it the right to unwind its agreement with Amazon and establish its independent e-commerce website. The company was later awarded $51 million in damages. In 2001, Amazon entered into a similar agreement with
Borders, under which Amazon would comanage Borders.com as a co-branded service. Borders pulled out of the arrangement in 2007, with plans to also launch its own online store. On October 18, 2011, Amazon.com announced a partnership with
DC Comics for the exclusive digital rights to many popular comics, including
Superman,
Batman,
Green Lantern,
Sandman, and
Watchmen. The partnership has caused well-known bookstores like
Barnes & Noble to remove these titles from its shelves. In November 2013, Amazon announced a partnership with the
United States Postal Service to begin delivering orders on Sundays. The service, included in Amazon's standard shipping rates, initiated in metropolitan areas of
Greater Los Angeles and
New York because of the high-volume and inability to deliver in a timely way, with plans to expand into
Dallas,
Houston,
New Orleans and
Phoenix by 2014. In June 2017,
Nike agreed to sell products through Amazon in exchange for better policing of counterfeit goods. This proved unsuccessful and Nike withdrew from the partnership in November 2019. Companies including
IKEA and
Birkenstock also stopped selling through Amazon around the same time, citing similar frustrations over business practices and counterfeit goods. In September 2017, Amazon ventured with one of its sellers JV Appario Retail owned by Patni Group which has recorded a total income of US$104.44 million (
₹759
crore) in financial year 2017–2018. ,
Amazon Fresh sold a range of
Booths branded products for home delivery in selected areas. In November 2018, Amazon reached an agreement with
Apple Inc. to sell selected products through the service, via the company and selected Apple Authorized Resellers. As a result of this partnership, only Apple Authorized Resellers may sell Apple products on Amazon effective January 4, 2019. On November 7, 2024, Amazon is reportedly discussing a second multi-billion dollar investment in AI startup
Anthropic, following its initial $4 billion investment. On 8 October 2025, Amazon launched prescription vending machines at One Medical clinics in Los Angeles. The machines are operated by Amazon Pharmacy and are able to prescribe a range of common medications, such as antibiotics, inhalers and blood pressure treatments.
Private-label products Amazon sells many products under its
own brand names, including phone chargers, batteries, and diaper wipes. The AmazonBasics brand was introduced in 2009, and now features hundreds of product lines, including smartphone cases, computer mice, batteries, dumbbells, and dog crates. Amazon owned 34 private-label brands . These brands account for 0.15% of Amazon's global sales, whereas the average for other large retailers is 18%. Other Amazon retail brands include Presto!, Mama Bear, and Amazon Essentials.
Third-party sellers Amazon derives many of its sales (around 40% in 2008) from third-party sellers who sell products on Amazon. Some other large e-commerce sellers use Amazon to sell their products in addition to selling them through their websites. The sales are processed through Amazon.com and end up at individual sellers for processing and order fulfillment and Amazon leases space for these retailers. Small sellers of used and new goods go to Amazon Marketplace to offer goods at a fixed price.
Affiliate program Publishers can sign up as affiliates and receive a commission for referring customers to Amazon by placing links to Amazon on their websites if the referral results in a sale. Worldwide, Amazon has "over 900,000 members" in its affiliate programs. In the middle of 2014, the Amazon Affiliate Program is used by 1.2% of all websites and it is the second most popular advertising network after
Google Ads. It is frequently used by websites and non-profits to provide a way for supporters to earn them a commission. Associates can access the Amazon catalog directly on their websites by using the
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
XML service. A new affiliate product, aStore, allows Associates to embed a subset of Amazon products within another website, or linked to another website. In June 2010, Amazon Seller Product Suggestions was launched to provide more transparency to sellers by recommending specific products to third-party sellers to sell on Amazon. Products suggested are based on customers' browsing history.
Product reviews Amazon allows users to submit reviews to the web page of each product. Reviewers must rate the product on a
rating scale from one to five stars. Amazon provides a badging option for reviewers that indicates the real name of the reviewer (based on confirmation of a credit card account) or that indicates that the reviewer is one of the top reviewers by popularity. , Amazon removed the ability of sellers and customers to comment on product reviews and purged their websites of all posted product review comments. In an email to sellers, Amazon gave its rationale for removing this feature: "...the comments feature on customer reviews was rarely used." The remaining review response options are to indicate whether the reader finds the review helpful or to report that it violates Amazon policies (abuse). If a review is given enough "helpful" hits, it appears on the front page of the product. In 2010, Amazon was reported as being the largest single source of Internet consumer reviews. When publishers asked Bezos why Amazon would publish negative reviews, he defended the practice by claiming that Amazon.com was "taking a different approach...we want to make every book available—the good, the bad and the ugly...to let truth loose". There have been cases of positive reviews being written and posted by
public relations companies on behalf of their clients and instances of writers using pseudonyms to leave negative reviews of their rivals' works.
Amazon sales rank The Amazon sales rank (ASR) indicates the popularity of a product sold on any Amazon locale. It is a relative indicator of popularity that is updated hourly. Effectively, it is a "best sellers list" for the millions of products stocked by Amazon. While the ASR has no direct effect on the sales of a product, it is used by Amazon to determine which products to include in its bestsellers lists. For competitive reasons, Amazon does not release actual sales figures to the public. However, Amazon has now begun to release
point of sale data via the
BookScan service to verified authors. While the ASR has been the source of much speculation by publishers, manufacturers, and marketers, Amazon itself does not release the details of its sales rank calculation algorithm. Some companies have analyzed Amazon sales data to generate sales estimates based on the ASR, though Amazon states:
Physical stores store in
Sevenoaks,
United Kingdom In November 2015, Amazon opened a physical
Amazon Books store in
University Village in
Seattle. The store was 5,500 square feet and prices for all products matched those on its website. Amazon opened its tenth physical bookstore in 2017; media speculation at the time suggested that Amazon planned to eventually roll out 300 to 400 bookstores around the country. In July 2016, the company announced that it was opening a square foot facility in
Palmer Township in the
Lehigh Valley region of eastern
Pennsylvania. , Amazon is the Lehigh Valley region's third-largest employer. In August 2019, Amazon applied to have a liquor store in
San Francisco, as a means to ship beer and alcohol within the city. In 2020,
Amazon Fresh opened several physical stores in the US and the
United Kingdom. In January 2026, Amazon announced it would close all of its Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh stores to shift focus to its online same-day delivery service and expand its Whole Foods Market business. The closure affects 57 Fresh stores and 15 Amazon Go locations, some of which will be converted into Whole Foods stores.
Hardware and services tablet Amazon has a number of products and services available, including its digital assistant
Alexa,
Amazon Music, and
Prime Video for music and videos respectively, the
Amazon Appstore for Android apps, the
Kindle line of
electronic paper e-readers,
Fire and
Fire HD color
LCD tablets.
Audible provides audiobooks for purchase and listening. In September 2021, Amazon announced the launch of
Astro, its first household robot, powered by its Alexa smart home technology. This can be remote-controlled when not at home, to check on pets, people, or home security. It will send owners a notification if it detects something unusual. In January 2023, Amazon announced the launch of RXPass, a prescription drug delivery service. It allows U.S.
Amazon Prime members to pay a $5 monthly fee for access to 60 medications. The service was launched immediately after the announcement except in states with specific prescription delivery requirements. Beneficiaries of government healthcare programs such as
Medicare and
Medicaid will not be able to sign up for RXPass.
Subsidiaries Amazon owns over 100 subsidiaries, including
Amazon Web Services,
Audible,
Diapers.com,
Goodreads,
IMDb, Kiva Systems (now
Amazon Robotics),
One Medical,
Shopbop, Teachstreet,
Twitch,
Zappos, and
Zoox. Bezos separately owns
The Washington Post (through Nash Holdings, LLC),
Blue Origin,
Bezos Expeditions,
Altos Labs, and other companies.
Amazon Live Amazon Live is a video
e-commerce live-streaming service created to compete with live-streaming services. The service allows users to stream live videos promoting or sponsoring products. Users (mainly celebrities or
Internet influencers) have the option to livestream on Amazon and add tags to additionally add context to the products they're selling or promoting. Other users can join in and type in messages to send to a global chat on the livestream.
Amazon Web Services ,
HOU-14 Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a subsidiary of Amazon that provides
on-demand cloud computing platforms and
APIs to individuals, companies, and governments, on a metered pay-as-you-go basis. These cloud computing
web services provide
distributed computing processing capacity and software tools via AWS
server farms. , AWS has 33% market share for cloud infrastructure while the next two competitors
Microsoft Azure and
Google Cloud have 21%, and 10% respectively, according to
Synergy Group.
Audible Audible is a seller and producer of spoken audio entertainment, information, and educational programming on the Internet. Audible sells digital
audiobooks,
radio and
television programs, and audio versions of magazines and newspapers. Through its production arm, Audible Studios, Audible has also become the world's largest producer of downloadable audiobooks. On January 31, 2008, Amazon announced it would buy Audible for about $300 million. The deal closed in March 2008 and Audible became a subsidiary of Amazon.
Goodreads Goodreads is a "
social cataloging" website founded in December 2006 and launched in January 2007 by Otis Chandler, a software engineer, and entrepreneur, and Elizabeth Khuri. The website allows individuals to freely search Goodreads' extensive user-populated database of books, annotations, and reviews. Users can sign up and register books to generate library catalogs and reading lists. They can also create their groups of book suggestions and discussions. In December 2007, the site had over 650,000 members, and over a million books had been added. Amazon bought the company in March 2013.
Ring Ring is a
home automation company founded by Jamie Siminoff in 2013. It is primarily known for its
Wi-Fi powered
smart doorbells, but manufactures other devices such as security cameras. Amazon bought Ring for US$1 billion in 2018.
Twitch at the
Electronic Entertainment Expo Twitch is a
live streaming platform for video, primarily oriented towards video gaming content. Twitch was acquired by Amazon in August 2014 for $970 million. The site's rapid growth had been boosted primarily by the prominence of major
esports competitions on the service, leading
GameSpot senior esports editor Rod Breslau to have described the service as "the
ESPN of esports". , the service had over 1.5 million broadcasters and 100 million monthly viewers.
Whole Foods Market store in
Ann Arbor, Michigan Whole Foods Market is an American
supermarket chain exclusively featuring foods without artificial preservatives, colors, flavors, sweeteners, and hydrogenated fats. Amazon acquired Whole Foods for $13.7 billion in August 2017. •
Amazon Academy, formerly JEE Ready, is an online learning platform for engineering students to prepare for competitive exams like the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE), launched by Amazon India on January 13, 2021 •
Amazon Maritime, Inc. holds a
Federal Maritime Commission license to operate as a
non-vessel-owning common carrier (NVOCC), which enables the company to manage its shipments from China into the United States. •
Amazon Pharmacy is an online delivery service dedicated to prescription drugs, launched in November 2020. The service provides discounts up to 80% for generic drugs and up to 40% for branded drugs for Prime subscribe users. The products can be purchased on the company's website or at over 50,000 bricks-and-mortar pharmacies in the United States. •
Annapurna Labs, an Israel-based microelectronics company reputedly for US$350–370M acquired by
Amazon Web Services in January 2015 . •
Beijing Century Joyo Courier Services, which applied for a
freight forwarding license with the
US Maritime Commission. Amazon is also building out its logistics in
trucking and
air freight to potentially compete with
UPS and
FedEx. •
Brilliance Audio, an audiobook publisher founded in 1984 by Michael Snodgrass in
Grand Haven, Michigan. The company produced its first eight audio titles in 1985. At the time of the acquisition, Brilliance was producing 12–15 new titles a month. The technique involved recording on each of the two channels of each stereo track. •
CreateSpace, which offers self-publishing services for independent content creators, publishers, film studios, and music labels, became a subsidiary in 2009. • '''''', an electronics company specializing in mesh-networking
Wi-Fi founded as a startup in 2014 by Nick Weaver, Amos Schallich, and Nate Hardison to simplify and innovate the smart home. Eero was acquired by Amazon in 2019 for US$97 million. Eero has continued to operate under its banner and advertises its commitment to privacy despite early concerns from the company's acquisition. •
Health Navigator is a startup developing
APIs for online health services acquired in October 2019. The startup will form part of Amazon Care, which is the company's employee healthcare service. This follows the 2018 purchase of
PillPack for under $1 billion, which has also been included into Amazon Care. •
Junglee, a former online shopping service provided by Amazon that enabled customers to search for products from online and offline retailers in India. Junglee started as a virtual database that was used to extract information from the Internet and deliver it to enterprise applications. As it progressed, Junglee started to use its database technology to create a single window marketplace on the Internet by making every item from every supplier available for purchase. Web shoppers could locate, compare and transact millions of products from across the Internet shopping mall through one window. Amazon acquired Junglee in 1998, and the website Junglee.com was launched in India in February 2012 as a comparison-shopping website. It curated and enabled searching for a diverse variety of products such as clothing, electronics, toys, jewelry, and video games, among others, across thousands of online and offline sellers. Millions of products are browsable, the client selects a price, and then they are directed to a seller. In November 2017, Amazon closed down Junglee.com and the former domain currently redirects to Amazon India. •
Kuiper Systems, a subsidiary of Amazon, set up to deploy a
broadband satellite internet constellation with an announced 3,236
Low Earth orbit satellites to provide satellite based Internet connectivity. •
Lab126, developers of integrated consumer electronics such as the
Kindle, became a subsidiary in 2004. •
Shelfari, a former
social cataloging website for books. Shelfari users built virtual bookshelves of the titles which they owned or had read and they could rate, review,
tag and discuss their books. Users could also create groups that other members could join, create discussions and talk about books, or other topics. Recommendations could be sent to friends on the site for what books to read. Amazon bought the company in August 2008. •
Souq, the former largest
e-commerce platform in the
Arab world. The company launched in 2005 in
Dubai,
United Arab Emirates and served multiple areas across the Middle East. On March 28, 2017, Amazon acquired Souq.com for $580 million. The company was re-branded as Amazon and its infrastructure was used to expand Amazon's online platform in the Middle East. •
Zoox, Amazon's self-driving subsidiary, operates in the US and expects to start charging passengers for rides in Las Vegas in early 2026. Amazon also has investments in renewable energy, including plans to fund four
small nuclear reactors at the
Xe-100 reactor site in Eastern
Washington, and plans to expand its position into the Canadian market through an investment in a new plant in
Alberta. == Operations ==