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Comment by djhworld | Hacker News Reader

I used to be a prime member, for quite a number of years, but I cancelled it as I didn't feel I was getting the value out of it that I originally thought I was.

There's a break even point somewhere where the cost of shipping vs. number of orders made makes sense with prime, but I wasn't using the service enough to warrant that. Additionally the other services you get with a prime membership (Amazon Video, Amazon music etc) didn't really have that much appeal.

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As a German prime customer I recently cancelled. Mostly because next day shipping didn't work 75% of the time and I was unable to find the appropriate form to complain about this.

Also, all their apps are crap. Prime Video has a 300ms audio delay on my Android TV and chromecasting to said TV has an even worse delay. Their app is also extremely clunky to use and on top of that it's super slow on all my devices. It also kills all other running apps on my TV because it's so memory hungry. Sending feedback doesn't help, it's a lost cause.

Their music streaming app sent me to Spotify years ago because it crashed all the time and was slow, too.

> Prime Video has a 300ms audio delay on my Android TV and chromecasting to said TV has an even worse delay

We use a fire stick, and it has the same issue for Prime Video. We have to pause the show for a couple seconds and then start it back up to get it back in sync. It's totally annoying.

> Also, all their apps are crap. Prime Video has a 300ms audio delay on my Android TV and chromecasting to said TV has an even worse delay.

Casting to a 2nd gen Chromecast from the prime video Android app works just fine for me.

I don't expect a built in function to the TV to be even remotely useful and have yet to see one that is snappy and not crap.

Until a few months ago, Chromecasting wasn't even an option, so their only app didn't work on a device where Netflix, YouTube, VLC, Kodi, etc. are working just fine.

Amazon can build backend infrastructure but their frontend is always bad. I have never used a single Amazon app that was well made, simple to use, and resource efficient.

As someone who shops at Whole Foods all the time, despite the seemingly ridiculously small discounts you get as a prime member, it does add up to cover most of the cost of prime membership.

I do use prime services, so I might otherwise keep my membership — but I would consider cancelling if I were just using it for shipping.

5% back at Whole Foods using the Chase Amazon card vs 3% back without Prime. $119 annual Prime membership pays for itself after just $5,950 of Whole Foods shopping. :-)

Nice, sounds like the cost can be recouped after just a few trips to Whole Foods.

5950/12 = 496$/month. Not that crazy for family with kids to spend even at a cheaper grocery store.

You also get 5% back at Amazon so it's definitely doable (I know i hit that last year).

Not crazy for a couple who cooks a lot, for that matter

It's pretty insane for a couple. I live in the UK granted, but we cook every night, and our food bill is less than half that.

Mine is double yours then. It could be cheaper , sure, but I don’t buy crazy expensive stuff. I do spend more on meat and things by being careful about sourcing

Is there irony in referring to shopping at Amazon-owned Whole Foods (regardless of their pre-acquisition reputation) as "careful about sourcing?"

No - I don't shop at whole foods; didn't think I suggested that I do.

When I say "careful about sourcing", I mean that a good percentage of what I buy comes directly or nearly directly from local farms. It costs more than the random grocery store stuff from large distributors. I can afford it so I don't mind and the markup isn't crazy.

Between the 10% bonus discount on sale prices and prime-only sales at WF, our prime membership pays for itself without the prime credit card, even though we do most of our grocery shopping at other stores.

> break even point somewhere where the cost of shipping vs. number of orders

Shipping without prime can still be free. You just need a minimum purchase, extra shipping time, and you have to REMEMBER to select free shipping before clicking on purchase.

Same boat. For about two years I used it to have groceries delivered via Prime Now. The nuances of dried out vs oily coffee beans and greens were enough to not forgo in-person altogether. Haven’t missed my subscription in ~3 years.

Big picture, let’s hope I don’t need anything enough for one or two day delivery. Happy with regular delivery.

Do you listen to music at all? Amazon Music is comparable to spotify or apple music so that in of itself pays for the membership.

Prime music streaming offers about 2 million tracks, vs Unlimited offering “tens of millions” of songs—and costs extra. So it's not apples-to-apples unless you pay extra on top or your Prime subscription for music unlimited.

True. But as a Prime member, their Unlimited service costs me $79/yr, versus $120 for Spotify. The $41 that I'm saving covers one-third of my cost for Prime itself.

Combine that with the fact that Prime Video is reaching the point where I would pay for it as a standalone streaming service. At this point, the free shipping portion of Prime is for me becoming the ancillary add-on service, rather than the other way around.

Good point: "The $41 that I'm saving covers one-third of my cost for Prime itself". Though what I'm really paying for is Spotify's excellent discovery (weekly suggestions, etc). I'll have to check out how well Prime does discovery.

If you decide prime has value, the add-on for music is an obvious choice when the big streaming services have feature parity these days.

What I'm really paying for is Spotify's excellent discovery (weekly suggestions, etc). I'll have to check out how well Prime does discovery.

Prime isn't comparable to spotify in that regard though considering the catalog differences. If you want to compare apples to apples you need to consider trying unlimited from Amazon Music.

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