For Brits, Sunday is the final day to enjoy Amazon Prime Video without adverts.
The streaming giant is rolling out ads to all UK users on Monday (February 5) – and those who don’t want to see them will have to pay an extra fee of £2.99 per month.
Amazon confirmed to MailOnline that they will appear before and during TV shows and movies, just like on commercial television channels.
In the US, adverts arrived on Amazon Prime Video users less than a week ago (January 29), but they’re already proving unpopular.
Taking to X (Twitter), one frustrated user said: ‘I’ll be watching less Prime Video. Way to go, Amazon.’
Amazon’s move follows rivals Netflix and Disney+, both of which started rolling out ads to their cheapest subscription options in 2022
Taking to X (Twitter), one frustrated Amazon Prime Video user in LA said: ‘I’ll be watching less Prime Video. Way to go, Amazon’
Another told the tech giant: ‘I said I’d cancel Amazon Prime the first time you showed me an ad. That’s exactly what I did.’
Amazon announced the decision back in September to bring commercials to its streaming platform – which bring in millions of dollars from advertisers.
Amazon’s move follows rivals Netflix and Disney+, both of which started rolling out ads to their cheapest subscription options in 2022.
‘Prime Video movies and TV shows will include limited advertisements,’ Amazon said in an email to customers.
‘This will allow us to continue investing in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period of time.
‘We aim to have meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming TV providers.
‘No action is required from you, and there is no change to the current price of your Prime membership.’
Customers in Germany and Canada also get the ads starting from Sunday, Amazon told MailOnline, while people in France, Italy, Spain, Mexico and Australia will get them later in the year.
It means customers in other countries such as Ireland won’t get adverts on Prime Video for the time being – although this could soon change if and when the ad rollout expands further.
Tagging the official Prime Video and Amazon accounts, another posted: ‘I said I’d cancel Amazon Prime the first time you showed me an ad. That’s exactly what I did’
Amazon Prime Video users either have to pay an extra fee or sit through frustrating ad breaks
Amazon Prime Video is one of the products that customers get when they subscribe to Amazon Prime, the tech giant’s paid subscription service.
Amazon said it won’t be making changes to the current price of Prime, so customers who don’t mind seeing ads when they’re watching Prime Video won’t have to pay more money.
However, for those customers who don’t want to see ads, they will have to pay an extra fee – £2.99 per month.
Prime subscription in the US currently costs $14.99 per month or $139 per year, or £8.99/£95 in the UK.
So Prime users who don’t want to see ads on the streaming platform will be paying just shy of £12 – and that’s if they don’t spend extra on movies that aren’t included in the subscription package.
Furious Prime users took to X to criticise the move, with one describing it as the ‘final nail’ in the coffin of his subscription.
Another described Amazon execs as ‘clowns’ who are ‘greedy beyond all comprehension’.
Yet another said: ‘Amazon Prime Video introducing ads is really validating my decision to kill my Amazon Prime subscription this year.’
Traditionally, streaming platforms have required either a subscription fee or in the absence of such a fee shown advertisements to bring in revenue.
It used to be one or the other – not both – but this is rapidly changing thanks to the likes of billion-dollar behemoths Netflix, Disney and Amazon.
Furious Prime users took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to criticise the move, with one describing it as the ‘final nail’ in the coffin
One X user described Amazon execs as ‘clowns’ who are ‘greedy beyond all comprehension’
Netflix’s ad-supported tier – ‘Basic with adverts’ – launched in November 2022 and it was originally an alternative option to the existing ‘Basic’ tier for £6.99.
However, in 2023, Netflix got rid of this Basic tier – which didn’t show ads – in an attempt to force users towards the ad option.
Similarly, Disney+ introduced an ad tier, first for US users in December 2022, and then in the UK and eight other European countries in November.
Disney+ also announced a crackdown on password sharing, following a similar move from Netflix, which aims to increase the amount of new sign-ups.