How to Find Legitimate Amazon Product Tester Jobs and Identify Scams

There are seven avenues you can pursue to test Amazon products (or to get free or discounted items in other ways).

Note that some of these are more reputable than others. We’ll explain which ones are always trustworthy and which ones you should approach with care, if at all.

1. Join the Amazon Vine program

First and foremost, Amazon has their own product testing program called Amazon Vine. Joining this is the only fully legitimate way to become an Amazon product tester. That’s because in 2016, the company amended their guidelines to prohibit paying for reviews through any other service. 1

Testing products through Amazon Vine is a solid gig, but there are two catches:

• You don’t get paid for participating. Your “payment” will consist of the free products you’ll receive.
• Amazon Vine is an invite-only program, and not everyone can join it.

If you’re accepted, you’ll become a “Vine Voice,” which will be displayed alongside any reviews you write for the products you test.

When you start out as a tester, you’ll be able to order up to three items valued at less than $100 per day. Once you’ve been on the platform for a while and ordered up to 100 items (reviewing at least 90% of them), you’ll graduate from the “Silver” to the “Gold” tier and be able to order eight per day.

How do you get selected for Amazon Vine?

Amazon states that “customers who consistently write insightful reviews are most likely to be invited” to participate in Amazon Vine. 2 In other words, you need to:

• Have an Amazon account
• Regularly buy and review products
• Put a lot of effort into writing the best reviews possible

If you’re confused about what constitutes an insightful review, then think about what you would want to know about a product you were in the market for. A good review will often touch on an item’s:

• Quality: How does this item compare to similar items you’ve bought from other brands? Does it perform as advertised, and does it seem like it’ll last a long time or break or wear out quickly?
• Shipping: Did the product arrive on time? Was the packaging suitable, or could the items have gotten damaged while being delivered?
• Value for money: Would you consider this product worth the price tag?

A good review will also be unbiased—you’re evaluating a product, not writing an ad. If other customers mark your reviews as “helpful,” that will probably boost your chances of getting invited to Amazon Vine.

2. Sign up for sites that offer Amazon rebates and coupons

Again, Amazon Vine is the only fully legitimate way to become an Amazon product tester. While many sites claim they’ll pay you to test Amazon products, that largely isn’t true.

There are sites, however, that offer discounts or rebates for Amazon products. Some of these will also prompt you to leave reviews for the items you purchase through them, although this generally isn’t required.

Using these sites isn’t quite the same as being a professional product tester, but you will get some of the same benefits out of it (and these can be great sources of items to review if you’re looking to boost your chances of getting invited onto Amazon Vine eventually).

Popular discount and rebate sites

The most popular sites in this niche include:

• Snagshout: This website offers discounts and cashback rebates for Amazon products, and sometimes you may need to leave a review or complete a survey to get them. Most users report that the site is legit and pays as promised.
• Rebaid: You can claim 10 rebate offers in your first month, which gradually increases. Most users say the site is legit and that they haven’t had issues getting paid.
• Vipon: You can get up to 30 Amazon coupon codes per day, with a monthly limit of 300. However, the user feedback on Vipon is quite mixed, and while the site is legit, many users claim the coupon codes they’re given often don’t work.

3. Join product review groups on social media

If you have your heart set on testing and reviewing Amazon products but don’t want to go through the hassle of qualifying for the Amazon Vine program, it may be possible to find product reviewer gigs on Facebook.

There are certain groups that claim to put you in direct contact with sellers, who purportedly will give you free products with the understanding that you’ll review them.

However, we’d recommend you exercise caution if you try this approach. As you know, Amazon Vine is the only legitimate way to review products for compensation, so these groups are directly violating Amazon’s community guidelines.

Participating in these groups or agreeing to accept free products in exchange for reviews could get your Amazon account suspended.

Social media product review scams

We looked into several product reviewer groups on Facebook, and we found that many of them were distinctly shady.

When we tried to join, some asked us for personal information (including our contact info for messaging apps like WhatsApp and WeChat), and one required us to buy an expensive ebook, which contained a password needed to join.

These were significant red flags. We recommend proceeding with extreme caution or simply steering clear of these groups entirely.

You can find more tips on how to avoid “product reviewing” scams near the bottom of this article.

4. Writing reviews for sellers through freelancing platforms

If you’re familiar with freelancing platforms like Upwork or Fiverr, then you know that sometimes, sellers on Amazon will post ads on these sites looking for users to review their products, and they’ll pay you for doing so.

Again, this is against Amazon’s terms of service, so many of these posts eventually get taken down. However, we still found a few sellers on Upwork seeking reviewers for their products, and plenty of users advertising their services as Amazon product reviewers.

Note that most of these sellers seem to just want 5-star reviews, and their ads don’t specify if they’ll even send you the products in question.

It’s less likely that these sellers are out to scam you than the Facebook groups we mentioned above (and sites like Upwork do have payment protection systems to guard against that). However, it’s questionable whether this sort of work really counts as “product reviewing.” Arguably, it’s more like a low-paid kind of digital marketing.

It’s up to you whether you want to pursue these gigs. If you don’t want to risk getting banned from Amazon, our advice is to avoid any direct contact with sellers, even on reputable platforms like Upwork, and go through Amazon Vine to test products.

5. Testing other products through a third-party site

There are plenty of legitimate sites that will pay you to test products or complete market research surveys. The catch is that you won’t be testing products from Amazon.

These sites look for testers to give feedback on a variety of products, with the most common kinds being:

• Food & drinks
• Software
• Electronics
• Mobile apps
• Clothing & footwear

Sometimes, you may see products that are also available on Amazon. However, you won’t actually order through them, and none of these third-party programs are endorsed by Amazon.

Here are some of the most popular product testing sites on the market:

Popular Product Testing Services

This is a reasonably representative selection of what’s out there, but there are many other sources of product testing jobs. Do some research and see if any of the alternatives to Amazon Vine grab your interest.

6. Sign up for Amazon’s affiliate marketing initiatives

The big takeaway from all of this is that aside from Amazon Vine itself, legitimate Amazon product testing jobs are difficult to come by. However, content creators and social media influencers can make money by inviting people to buy Amazon products with affiliate links.

While these aren’t product tester jobs as such, they are official programs run by Amazon, so there’s no chance of violating Amazon’s policies or getting scammed. With a little work, you can also leverage them to set up an independent product testing gig of your own (by ordering products, reviewing them for your audience, and then posting links to them).

How Amazon affiliate marketing works

Amazon has two affiliate programs, which are quite similar to each other. With both, you’ll get a commission of up to 20% when someone purchases a product through a link you post.

You can see a breakdown of both programs in the table below.

Amazon’s Affiliate Programs

As we’ve mentioned, there are many scammers who claim to pay people to test Amazon products. These scams are growing increasingly sophisticated, and if you’ve read other articles like this, some of them might have even featured scams alongside legitimate product testing side hustles.

Common product testing scams

Product testing scams will often prompt you to pay a fee to sign up or to buy products with your own money. If you do, you almost certainly won’t receive the products as promised, and you won’t be reimbursed.

Even worse, many are also phishing scams, meaning that the scammers will try to trick you into revealing sensitive personal information (such as your credit card or Social Security number). They may do this by directing you to a fake login page that’s designed to collect your information.

You may see product testing scams advertised via:

• Email
• Direct message on platforms like WhatsApp
• Social media platforms
• Text message

Sometimes, you may even see people you know advertising scams. Hackers have been known to gain access to social media profiles and message their contacts claiming they’ve made money with a product testing program.

5 signs of an Amazon product testing scam

Often, you can tell straight away that a job is a scam, but some are more sophisticated. Watch out for these red flags:

1. Asking for payment upfront

Scammers will commonly ask you to pay to participate in their programs, claiming they’ll pay you back once you test their products.

Don’t be fooled. Legitimate product testing programs never ask you to pay to test products. Be cautious of any program that asks you to pay to join (or to pay “processing” or “shipping” fees).

2. Lack of an online footprint

Product testing scams often use fake email addresses or direct you to fake websites. Always do your research before you sign up; make sure the company or client you’re considering working for has a verifiable presence and that there are credible-seeming reports from other people who’ve made money working for them.

For instance, if you’re considering working for someone on Upwork, check their star rating and reviews from previous freelancers. If they signed up for the platform yesterday or otherwise have a very short track record, steer clear.

Due to Amazon’s ban on third-party product testing programs, even clients that really do pay have to fly somewhat under the radar due to the risk of getting shut down, but if you can’t find any verifiable information about a company or client that’s offering a product testing gig, it’s probably a scam.

3. Lack of contact information

Similarly, legitimate companies provide contact information. A real company will have a “Contact Us” page featuring information like their:

• Phone number
• Physical address
• Customer service email address

If you can’t get ahold of the company advertising a product testing program, don’t take the risk of signing up for it.

4. Too-good-to-be-true offers

The unfortunate fact is that anything that seems to be too good to be true probably is.

You won’t be able to earn a $500 gift card in exchange for a 50-word review of a can opener. Product testing isn’t a very highly paid side hustle, and legitimate jobs pay far less than what most scam programs advertise.

5. Out-of-character behavior

As mentioned, sometimes hackers gain access to social media profiles and use them to advertise their scams.

If someone you know tells you about a job opportunity, check that their tone matches their other messages. If they include any strange links in their messages, it’s likely their account has been compromised.

What to do if you suspect a product testing gig is a scam

If something about an Amazon product testing job seems suspicious, listen to your instincts. There are other ways to make money and get free stuff—we listed several of them above—and the risk just isn’t worth it.

If you aren’t sure whether something’s a scam, there are tools that you may be able to use to verify it (although not all scams have been identified yet, so if something comes up negative, that doesn’t necessarily prove that it’s safe). Try:

• Conducting a web search: Enter the name of the client, social media group, or website in question into Google and see if anyone’s written an article exposing it as a scam. You can also check on social media to see if anyone has flagged the program; one good place to look is the subreddit r/Scams.
• Reading user reviews: There are several websites, including Trustpilot and the Better Business Bureau, that aggregate user reviews. Many scams have been reported on these sites, and it’s always worth a check to see if they’ve collected any concerning reports about the product testing job you’re considering.
• Checking suspicious links: If you receive an email that includes links, paste them into the site Get Safe Online to see if it goes to a known scam. When in doubt, just don’t click the link, since not all scams have been identified yet and new ones are popping up all the time.

If you do encounter an Amazon product testing scam, be sure to report it to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) or the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3). You can also directly notify Amazon themselves.

This space is murkier than it should be; many sites include a lot of information about product testing jobs that simply isn’t true. The table below lists several major myths and misconceptions about being an Amazon product tester (some of which we’ve covered already, but they’re worth repeating).

Major Amazon Product Tester Myths