How to Become an Amazon Product Tester

Amazon runs their own program, called Amazon Vine, for product testers and reviewers. Signing up for it is the most obvious way to get into this side hustle.

However, there are two catches with Amazon Vine:

• It doesn’t pay cash: You won’t actually get paid for taking part in Amazon Vine. Instead, you’ll get to keep the products you test (which you’ll receive free of charge). Getting free stuff is always great, but this isn’t the best option for those looking to generate actual income from their side hustle.
• It’s invite-only: What’s more, not everyone can join Amazon Vine. Amazon has to invite you to participate, something we’ll talk about in detail below.

If you do get an invite to Amazon Vine and accept it, you’ll become a “Vine Voice” who can order selected items for free in exchange for reviewing them. You’ll also get other perks, including early access to certain new or pre-released products that aren’t available to the general public yet.

Who’s eligible to take part in Amazon Vine?

Amazon Vine’s webpage states that “customers who consistently write insightful reviews are most likely to be invited” to participate in the program. 1 In other words, to have a chance of being invited, you’ll need to:

• Have an active Amazon account
• Regularly leave thoughtful and well-written product reviews
• Do this long enough to catch the eye of someone on Amazon Vine’s staff

It’s hard to say exactly how high Amazon’s standards are. When we researched this piece, we found widely varying accounts from people claiming to be Amazon Vine reviewers, and not much official information we could use to verify them.

In one recent Reddit thread on the subreddit r/AmazonVine, for instance, some users report that they were invited after leaving just a handful of reviews, whereas others claim they left hundreds or even thousands before getting noticed.

The upshot is that while writing reviews consistently will definitely help your chances, other factors—including luck—also clearly play a role in the selection process.

How to become a product tester on Amazon Vine in 6 steps

That said, let’s take a look at the steps required to become a product tester with Amazon Vine:

1. Sign up for Amazon

This is a no-brainer, but you’ll need an Amazon account to get invited to Amazon Vine. Setting up an account is simple:

1. Go to the Amazon homepage
2. Click on “Accounts & Lists” in the top right corner
3. Click “Create your Amazon account” at the bottom
4. Enter your name and an email address or phone number, then create a password
5. Check your email or text messages (depending on whether you used an email or phone to sign up); you should have a message prompting you to verify your account
6. Click the link in that message

After that, your account will be active, and you’ll be able to buy products and leave reviews.

2. Start reviewing products

As we mentioned, the amount of reviews you need to write to get invited to Amazon Vine seems inconsistent, but regardless of whether it takes you five reviews or five hundred, the first step is to start writing them.

Make sure they’re engaging, clear, concise, and, above all, genuine. Add as many important details as possible without writing irrelevant filler.

To give you an idea of what to shoot for, here’s an example of a useful product review on Amazon:

As you can see, the reviewer has comprehensively described the product. It’s clear that they’ve genuinely bought and used it (something that’s not a given, particularly in the age of AI), and they aren’t afraid to critique aspects they weren’t satisfied with.

This isn’t the only way of writing a review (for some products, an ideal review might be shorter or longer, and some people try to make their reviews funny), but all other things being equal, this is a decent benchmark to measure yours against. If you consistently leave reviews of this quality, you probably have a good shot at being invited to Amazon Vine eventually.

3. Sign up after receiving your invite from Amazon Vine

If and when you’re selected to become a Vine Voice, you’ll receive an invite to join Amazon Vine (usually via email).

You’ll need to follow the steps in the email to accept their offer. Once you do, you’ll get access to the Amazon Vine Voices portal.

4. Order eligible products

After getting into the Vine Voices portal, you’ll get access to a special list of products that you can order for free.

Amazon Vine has two different “tiers” for its reviewers. The tier you’re in will affect how many orders you can place and what items you’ll have access to.

• Silver: All Vine Voices start at this tier. As a Silver member, you can order up to three items valued at less than $100 per day. You need to keep your “review rate” (the percentage of your orders you’ve reviewed) at or above 50% to continue participating.
• Gold: If you order at least 100 items and review at least 90% of them, you’ll reach the Gold tier, which gives you access to higher-value products and lets you place up to eight orders per day. Be aware that higher-value items reportedly get snapped up quickly, so if you see something you want, act fast.

5. Test your products and review them

When you get your products from Amazon Vine, test them out and leave reviews for them (just as you did before getting invited). Again, your reviews should be clear, engaging, and honest. If you don’t like a product, don’t be afraid to say so.

For transparency, Amazon marks all reviews from Vine Voices with a special badge stating “Vine Customer Review of Free Product.”

Keep an eye on your review-to-order ratio and take care to not over-order without completing your outstanding reviews. Again, reviewing less than 50% of your orders can get you kicked off the program.

6. Keep an eye on your evaluation periods

When you check out the “Your Vine activity” section in your profile, you’ll see that Amazon tracks your orders and submitted and approved reviews. The platform will assess you regularly to determine what tier you belong in (and confirm that your stats are good enough for you to remain on Amazon Vine at all).

These assessments are referred to as “evaluation periods” or “reevaluations.” In theory, you’re not supposed to know when they start; however, one user on the r/AmazonVine subreddit found that you can pull the date of your reevaluation from your account’s “Stats” page (although it requires a bit of tech know-how to do so).

To get your evaluation date, follow these steps:

• Visit your Stats page and view its source code (on many web browsers, you can do this by typing “view-source:” before the page’s URL)
• Search for a line that says “reevaluationDate” and copy the long number that appears right after it
• Enter that into an EPOCH converter to display your evaluation date (EPOCH is a date-and-time format used by many software platforms)

Once you have your evaluation date, write it down and do your best to raise your Amazon Vine stats (such as your review rate) in time to graduate into the next tier by the time you reach it.

Using Amazon Vine can be a decent side hustle, but if you don’t feel like putting in the work to get invited onto the platform, you have other options. There are several third-party sites out there that will pay you to test products.

However, there’s a catch here, too. Legitimate product-testing sites don’t source their products from Amazon.

That’s because in 2016, Amazon amended their rules to ban people from writing reviews for compensation. The Amazon Vine program is the only exception. 2

This means that if a website or company invites you to review Amazon products for money (or even just for free items), they’re violating Amazon’s policies. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’re a scam, but it is a significant red flag.

Legitimate third-party product testing websites

With that out of the way, if you’re interested in ordering products online and testing them for money, you still have options. You can get paid to test a wide range of products (many of which are also available on Amazon, even though that’s not where you’ll actually order them from when you test them).

Major legitimate product testing sites include:

• McCormick & Company, Inc.: McCormick produces packaged goods, especially food and beverages. They have a product testing program that’s available up to 4 times per year.
• MindField: We interviewed one product tester, Louida Martin, who singled this out as a service to watch out for, telling us that they seemed quite active and had been around for a long time. Reportedly, they focus on hygiene, skincare, and beauty products.
• Product Report Card: This is one of the better-known online product testing programs, and it includes a wide variety of products, ranging from food to bath products to video games. In some cases, you may be paid in the form of Amazon credit; other times, you might receive a Visa gift card or a check.
• UserTesting: In contrast to the other entries on this list (as well as Amazon Vine), UserTesting focuses on digital products. If you’re mainly interested in this side hustle because you want free items from Amazon, it probably isn’t a great fit, but if you’re looking for a low-key product testing gig that you can do while sitting at your computer, it might be just right for you.

This list is far from complete; there are dozens of sites that provide these sorts of opportunities. You can check out our full list of product tester jobs if you want to learn more.

Sites that offer Amazon discounts and rebates

If you’re set on testing products from Amazon, specifically, the sites we just listed won’t scratch that itch. Fortunately, there are other websites that you can use to get discounts or rebates (cash back when you spend a certain amount) on Amazon products.

Although these sites frequently appear in articles on how to become an Amazon product tester (like this one), it’s important to note that these aren’t actually product testing websites.

You don’t have to actually test or review the items you get, and these companies won’t pay you for doing so. The sellers they partner with are just looking to increase their sales and get their products noticed.

We’ve listed three major sites that offer Amazon discounts and rebates in the table below, along with a quick overview of what most users seem to think about them.

Amazon Discount and Rebate Sites

If you’re a content creator (e.g., a blogger), you can also review Amazon products independently and get paid for it.

Amazon facilitates this with several programs. One is called Amazon Associate, an affiliate marketing program that lets you promote products and earn a commission of 1%–20% if people buy them.

How does Amazon Associate work?

Essentially, as a user of Amazon Associate, you’ll post links to products that you want to promote. If someone clicks your link and buys the item in question, you’ll get paid.

To turn this into a product testing side hustle, you can follow these steps:

• Buy products from Amazon that you’re interested in (or think your audience might be interested in)
• Test and review them on your platform, posting your thoughts about them
• Include a link in your review so your readers or viewers can buy the product if they’re interested

Your audience probably won’t want to purchase every item you review—after all, if you evaluate them honestly, you probably won’t be able to recommend each one. However, they’ll buy some of them.

Of course, for this to be a viable side hustle, you need to be a popular creator (or you need to be willing to put in the time to start a blog or another content creation side hustle and build up a following). Your affiliate links won’t earn you any money if you don’t have an audience.

Who’s eligible to be a product tester for Amazon Associate?

Like Amazon Vine, Amazon Associate isn’t available to just anyone. To participate in the program, you need to have a platform that you’ll realistically be able to use to direct customers to Amazon’s site.

Amazon evaluates applicants on a case-by-case basis, but they often apply the following criteria: 3

• Blogs: Blogs must be publicly available (not password-protected or hidden behind a paywall) and must be fairly active; Amazon suggests having at least 10 posts. These should be “recent” (within the last 60 days).
• Social media accounts: You can use Amazon Associate if you’re a content creator on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, or Twitch. Your profile must be “established,” with a decent number of followers (“in most cases, at least 500,” in Amazon’s words).
• Mobile apps: If you happen to be a mobile app creator, you may also be able to qualify. Review Amazon Associate’s mobile app guidelines to see if you’re eligible.

Regardless of your chosen content creation platform, you also need to be at least 18 years old and must have a valid tax ID.

How to sign up for Amazon Associate

If you think you qualify, you can sign up by following these steps:

1. Go to the Amazon Associate homepage
2. Click “Sign up”
3. Sign in to your usual Amazon account
4. Select the main contact for the account
5. Enter the details for your site, social media profile, or mobile app
6. Enter any other details Amazon Associate requests (including your tax information)

After that, all you have to do is wait to be approved. Note that if you are, to remain eligible for Amazon Associate, you’ll need to make at least 3 sales within 180 days of being accepted onto the program.

Amazon Influencer is another affiliate program from Amazon that’s geared towards social media creators.

You can earn money from it in much the same way—testing and reviewing products for your followers, then posting links to the items. You’ll receive a commission when people buy them.

How does Amazon Influencer work?

Overall, Amazon Influencer is quite similar to the Amazon Associate program. For instance, it also pays a variable 1%–20% commission.

However, it’s exclusively available to social media creators (which means bloggers don’t qualify), and it differs in the way participants direct traffic toward products.

In contrast to “associates,” who just post links to other people’s stores, “influencers” can set up their own storefronts on Amazon. You’ll still send your followers to other people’s products rather than your own, but you’ll aggregate them on a page that you control.

In other words, you’ll maintain a curated list of products that you recommend.

Who’s eligible to be a product tester for Amazon Influencer?

Amazon Influencer has stricter requirements than Amazon Associates. This program is only available to creators on these social media platforms:

• Instagram
• Facebook
• TikTok
• YouTube

If you’re an Instagram or Facebook influencer, you must use a business account instead of a personal account. Moreover, you must have a sizable number of followers and decent engagement, although Amazon doesn’t specify exactly what they look for. (It probably goes without saying that you’ll also need an active Amazon account, too.)

How to sign up for Amazon Influencer

To participate in the Amazon Influencer program, follow these steps:

1. Go to the Amazon Influencer homepage
2. Click “Sign up”
3. Sign in to your usual Amazon account
4. Choose the social media account that you want to connect to the program
5. Wait to see if you’re approved
6. If you’re accepted, follow Amazon’s instructions to set up your profile and storefront

Reportedly, if you apply using YouTube or Facebook, you’ll know instantly if you’ve been approved, whereas Instagram or TikTok users may have to wait 5 days or even longer to hear back.

Assuming Amazon accepts you onto the platform, you’ll be ready to begin. Start buying products, testing them out, and reviewing for your audience.