Prime Video Is Gaining on Free Shipping as the Main Reason People Subscribe to Amazon Prime
Brian Welk
Perhaps Amazon Prime is not just a means of getting next-day toilet paper directly to your door. A new survey suggests that Amazon Prime Video is becoming so important to Prime users, it is closing the gap on the e-retailer’s free, fast shipping as the top reason people subscribe to Amazon Prime.
A Tuesday research note by the investment-banking firm Evercore ISI, obtained by IndieWire, has the latest results of an annual survey of 1,100 Amazon Prime members in the U.S. over the last two weeks. The analysts there found a spike in the number of members who listed Prime Video as one of their top reasons for maintaining a subscription to the Amazon services bundle (respondents could pick from multiple options). Sixty-one percent of respondents chose Prime Video among the main reasons they subscribe; 73 percent chose the shipping benefit.
The two top perks are trending in very different directions. In the prior three years of the survey, free shipping hovered above 80 percent, while Prime Video sat around 45 percent.
Prime Shipping and Prime Video are 1 and 2, and could soon be 1 and 1a. Either way, they dwarf the other reasons people say they subscribe, like for Prime Music (35 percent), grocery delivery (23 percent), Amazon Photo Storage (19 percent), and Prime Reading (13 percent).
Evercore ISI estimates people who shop on Amazon.com has reached 110 million households in the U.S. With the survey saying 81 percent of all Amazon users also use Amazon Prime, that would mean about 90 million have been converted to paying Prime members, according to the analysts’ estimation.
The last time Amazon disclosed any subscriber numbers to Prime, it said in 2021 that it had surpassed 200 million users globally, and Prime Video head Mike Hopkins recently told the New York Times it’s now “well above 200 million” and “growing.” Another report via Bloomberg and Consumer Intelligence Research Partners recently pegged sales for Prime at hitting a high of 180 million shoppers in the U.S. this past March.
Because Prime Video is tied up with the other offerings, we also don’t know how many Prime members explicitly watch Prime Video. But the Evercore ISI survey says 80 percent of Prime users also watch Prime Video, which would be about 72 million people in the U.S. Not too shabby if true, considering Netflix recently reported 82.7 million subscribers in the U.S. and Canada.
As both Prime and Prime Video usage grow, the percentage of Prime members who say they watched Prime Video has declined somewhat from recent surveys. But this year’s survey saw a spike in people who said they’re watching more Prime Video now than they have in the past.
Exactly half of respondents, 50 percent, said they watch Prime Video more now than when they initially started, a jump of 12 percent from 2023. Three-quarters of Amazon.com users also said they were “extremely” or “very satisfied” with Prime Video.
Evercore ISI says one reason for the spike could be the addition of Amazon’s “Thursday Night Football” NFL package. Per Nielsen, the 16 games averaged 12 million viewers each last season. Per Evercore’s data, 58 percent — or approximately 52 million U.S. Prime households — at least sampled a game on the service.
The analysts believe that gap between the average and the overall number of viewers suggests Amazon has a chance to turn some of those casual viewers into more loyal fans, which would be good for advertising impressions, overall engagement, and satisfaction with Prime Video.
With some “Thursday Night Football” tailwinds, Amazon is doubling down on sports. Amazon is reportedly among the companies carving out a rich package of NBA games for the next 11 years, and it has a partnership in Canada with the NHL. Amazon will also have an exclusive NFL Wild Card playoff matchup in January; hey, it worked for Peacock.
