Prime Video launching interactive shopping ads during pauses – 9to5Mac

2024 is shaping up to be the year of ads for Amazon Prime Video.

In January the streaming service, which has long been ad-free, debuted an ad-based tier and instantly moved nearly all its users into that tier. Since then, the only way for Prime subscribers to avoid ads has been to pay an extra $3 per month.

Pretty soon, that $3 option may be more compelling as Prime Video is planning to increase the number of ways users will see ads and make shopping a key component of those ads.

From Scharon Harding at Ars Technica:

Those who opted for Prime Video with commercials will soon see shoppable carousel ads, interactive pause ads, and interactive brand trivia ads, as Amazon calls them. Amazon said that advertisers could buy these new displays to be shown “across the vast majority of content on Prime Video, wherever it’s streamed.” All the new ad formats allow a viewer to place advertised products in their Amazon cart.

Here’s what each of the three ad changes will bring:

• Carousel ads will play during the normal ad breaks, providing a variety of suggested items to shop for and the option to add them directly to your Amazon cart.
• Pause ads are a new addition, bringing advertising to the pause screen for featured products which will also include an ‘Add to cart’ button.
• Brand trivia ads will seek to promote ad engagement by offering incentives like Amazon shopping credits.

9to5Mac’s Take

Making ads more interactive to promote shopping was a natural next step for the e-commerce juggernaut. Ad-based tiers have become a norm for nearly every streaming service. But at a time when competition among streamers is so strong, it still feels like a lot of not-so-great change for Prime Video users in a short span of time.

Apple TV+ is the one major streaming player still holding on to its ad-free approach. As more moves like this happen, though, it will be interesting to see how much longer that approach lasts.