Amazon Music starts playing ads for some Prime users, but the US is safe... for now

Amazon Prime is one subscription service that’s just packed with benefits: free shipping, Prime Video, Music Prime, and even Luna gaming. But those benefits have also become more and more restrictive in recent years — first Prime Video introduced ads, and then it paywalled 4K content. What’s going to be the next Prime perk that Amazon ends up dialing back or charging extra for? Based on what we’re seeing happening internationally, there may be reason to be worried about Music Prime.

Right now, Amazon Music Prime is included with your Prime membership and allows listeners to shuffle play artists, albums, or playlists, ad-free. If you want more control over your music, you can get Music Standard or Music Unlimited, both available with an additional subscription.

Earlier today, one of Android Authority’s contributors received the following email, informing them of changes to their Music benefits:

In the interest of getting to the bottom of this, we reached out directly to Amazon. The company tells us:

Today’s news is specific to the Amazon Music offering in India only.

Over in India, Amazon is launching Music Unlimited for the first time — and using the opportunity to bring ads to Music Prime.

Amazon Music Prime fans in the US can breathe easy for now, knowing that they aren’t getting ads forced upon them — well, not today, anyway. We can’t deny that the company’s choice of language leaves the door open for the introduction of ads in other nations at some point in the future. And based on the trends we’ve been seeing with the likes of Prime Video… well, you’d forgive us for thinking this might be less a question of “if” than it is “when.”

For now, though, relax, fire up Amazon Music Prime, and maybe check out a nice podcast. There’s a lot of good content in there, and you might as well enjoy it ad-free while that’s still a thing.