Amazon Prime

I love shopping online, and a good majority of it comes from Amazon.com. That site has just made everything so simple, it has it all in one place and gets shipped right to your door. Christmas shopping, books (check out books we enjoy here), movies, clothes, toys, health food and supplements, groceries… you can get it all from the comfort of your home. I’m sure I’m not telling you anything you don’t know.

With how often I shop there, I’m glad I’m a member of Amazon Prime. I first signed up for it when I was a graduate student and it came as part of my “Amazon Student” package for like $39. After that student rate expired, it was a no-brainer for me to continue my membership even at the $99 full price rate. It brings so many benefits and more than pays for itself every year with all the ways I use it.

What Do You Get With Amazon Prime?

Free 2-Day Shipping

The aspect of Prime that benefits me the most is the free 2-day shipping on all orders. Once I signed up, I started buying everything through that site since it had all I needed and without paying shipping, I got it all at a great price and didn’t have to leave the house. You figure somewhere around $5+ for shipping on most orders (sometimes a lot more for larger items), when you shop often enough you’ll more than pay for your membership through this feature alone. I know I have.

There’s also Prime Now, which gets you free 2 HOUR shipping on certain items if you live in an eligible zip code. I haven’t used this myself but will definitely be exploring it in the near future.

Get a free 30-day trial membership now!

Amazon Videos and Music

Like I talk about in my review of the Amazon Fire Stick, every night before bed I fire it up and watch some Amazon Instant Video, Netflix, HBO, Hulu or whatever and put myself to sleep with some movies or TV. Included with your Prime membership is access to all of their streaming content. They have tons of movies and tv series to view and you’ll never run out of stuff to watch. In addition, they have a huge music library to listen to.

Kindle Lending Library

If you’re an avid reader and a Kindle owner, this is another great aspect of membership with Amazon Prime. It can be an expensive hobby buying books all the time, especially if you’re not one to go to the local library and check out books. With Prime, if you own a Kindle you get one free book per month from their vast library of books. If you make use of that every month, and calculate what it would have cost to purchase or rent those books over the course of a year, again you can see how membership pays for itself and then some.

Some way or another, I make use of my Prime membership every day. I probably make a purchase or two each week, access their streaming video more often than not at night, and try to read as much as possible. I pay for the membership in the savings on shipping costs alone, and I consider all the other aspects to just be icing on the cake. It’s a guarantee I’ll renew when my current annual membership expires and I don’t see that changing anytime soon.

To test the waters, you can sign up for a free 30-day trial and see how you like it!