Amazon Vine Voice Ultimate Guide

Summary: Amazon Vine to some people is literally like hitting the lottery. Once enrolled, there are hundreds and thousands of products to choose from, but there are rules to the program and unwritten rules that we will go over in this guide all about Amazon Vine.

What is Amazon Vine?

Amazon Vine is an invite only exclusive club where current active Amazon users can choose products to review to help buyers make better buying decisions. You will have the ability to test products for Amazon that have not even hit the market yet by big name brands and be among some of the first people to get their hands on these products and give a thoughtful and insightful review. Amazon Vine is currently available in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Japan. For the purpose of this article, we will be focusing on Amazon Vine Voices for the United States.

How Do You Access Your Amazon Vine Account?

Your account can be accessed on your desktop, laptop, tablet or your cell phone on your preferred browser at https://www.amazonvine.com/vine or by copying and pasting the URL directly into your browser.

Amazon Vine App

Amazon Vine does not have a dedicated app for the program. However, you can access the Amazon Vine area from the Amazon App by typing “Amazon Vine” into the search bar. However, the way the products are displayed on the app (or from a cell phone for that matter). What I recommend and what works best for me is if you are like me and more on your phone versus a desktop or laptop computer, then I would recommend changing your view for the Amazon tab in your browser on your phone to desktop view. This will allow you to see Amazon Vine as you would if you were on a desktop or laptop computer. It is much easier to view the program this way on your phone and depending on your screen size, you can see many more items this way which allows you to be quick to grab those brand name items when they drop before they disappear in seconds.

Amazon Vine Reviewer Program Eligibility Requirements

There is no rhyme or reason based on how an Amazon user gets invited into the program, but Amazon states, they select the most insightful users based on their reviews of products on their Amazon store. I think that is a pretty broad response from the company and I believe there is a lot more that goes into how they choose who becomes an Amazon Vine Voice and will explain more as I get deeper into this article.

How to Get Invited to Amazon Vine as a Vine Voice

The best advice I can give here is write reviews! There is more to it than that though. If you are the type of person that writes one or two words as a review (example: “as described”), you are more than likely not going to get an invitation for the program. Amazon Vine is looking for people that can provide detailed, thoughtful, accurate and insightful reviews on the products they receive. I am not saying that you have to write a book on a USB cable either. Providing a common sense perspective based on the item you receive is more than enough. Adding any images or videos is a plus but not mandatory. Reviews written with added images and videos take longer to get approved versus a review on a product without, so keep that in mind as well.

A tip would be to write a review based on your real world experience that people can identify with and find helpful. There is a thumbs up icon that users can click if they do find your review helpful which more than likely is part of Amazon’s algorithm to see if what you are writing is enough for people to click that little thumbs up based on your review.

For me personally, I have been an amazon user for about 20 years and an Amazon prime member for about 10 I would say. You do not have to be an Amazon Prime member to become an Amazon Vine Voice. I was never really that active in writing reviews on Amazon before I received their invitation to join the Amazon Vine program. I maybe wrote about 5 reviews during my years being on Amazon. The last review I did do was for a shoe holder and actually did a quick video because I liked it so much. I received my Amazon Vine invite shortly after that reviewed was approved. I did notice I did get a lot of “helpful” clicks for that review which I believe triggered something to Amazon to send out an invite for the Vine Voice program.

I have also been (and still) am very active on writing review on Google and I am also a Google Local Guide. I believe Amazon takes this into consideration as well and is part of their algorithm as to who gets an invitation. Of course I do not have any proof of this, and this is simply speculation on my part, but I believe that all of these systems work together. My reviews and photos on Google have millions of views and have helped countless people so I believe this was partially taken into consideration as well.

How Does Amazon Vine Work?

Once you accept the invite into the program there are some steps that you need to complete first before you are officially enrolled. The first step would be to visit your Vine Account dashboard. This is where you need to input all of your information which includes creating a tax profile. Once your tax profile is validated, your account will be approved and you will have the ability to order a limited number of items every day, choosing from thousands of products. If you vow not to opt in and sign the tax validation form, you will not be able to get your account verified and start ordering items. This is important because at the end of the tax year, if based in the U.S.A, Amazon will generate a 1099-NEC tax form that you will need to include when you do your yearly taxes.

The Amazon Vine Tax Profile Includes the Following Information that needs to be Filled Out

The IRS requires all Vine Voice members to provide their tax information to be compliant. The tax interview is used to determine and fulfill Amazon’s tax reporting and withholding obligations. For U.S. residents, tax reporting is required for orders totaling over $600 during the tax year by the Amazon Vine user.

In order to fulfill the IRS requirements, answer all of the questions and enter all of your information requested during the tax interview. Ensure you do not misspell your name or enter incorrect tax information which can result in not getting your tax information validated which can delay or deny your approval into the Amazon Vine Program. Read more about the Amazon Tax Interview.

Getting Started

1. What is Your Tax Classification (Individual or Business)
2. Are you a United States Citizen, U.S. Permanent Resident (green card holder), or other U.S. resident alien?

Tax Identity Information

1. 1. Full Name
   2. Doing Business as “DBA” or Trade Name (optional for businesses)
   3. U.S. Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) Type
      • You have the option of inputting your SSN, ITIN or EIN. If you are an individual, you are more then likely going to choose the SSN option. This is the most important part of the application so do not skip this!
   4. Address
   5. Country
   6. Address Line 1
   7. Address Line 2
   8. City
   9. State/Province/Region
   10. Zip/Postal Code

The turnaround for verification about the information you submitted is pretty quick, it is important to input the information as you would be filing your taxes as that is what gets matched to the IRS for verification purposes. Once approved, you are officially into the Amazon Vine Voice Program!

How Does Amazon Vine Work for Reviewers?

Access is granted into the Amazon Vine program based on your “good” standing in the Amazon reviewer community. If you missed your invitation email and want to determine if you have access to the vine program, visit https://www.amazon.com/vine/. Once you have completed the participation agreement and tax questionnaire, you will be a Vine Member and receive the Amazon Vine Member Badge.</p

What if I have Multiple Amazon Accounts?

If you have multiple accounts, the one with the highest reviewer ranking is most likely to have been chosen and the one that will most likely receive the invitation email.

Can I invite my Friends into the Amazon Vine Program?

No. Only customers who Amazon selects is allowed for participation into the program by receiving an email invitation.

Will Amazon Share My Contact Information with Brands that are participating for Reviews?

Amazon’s privacy policy notice applies to your participation agreement and what you need to fill out and sign before your acceptance is completed to gain access in the Vine program. The participation agreement describes Amazon’s practices regarding collection and use of personal information. Amazon.com does not share your identity or contact details to any product suppliers who participate in the program without consent of your permission.

Are Amazon Employees Eligible to Participate in the Amazon Vine Program?

No. As stated in Amazon’s Vine Voice participation agreement, Amazon employees are not eligible to participate in the Amazon Vine program.

Who Sends Me Amazon Vine Products?

Amazon Vine products will be shipped and delivered straight from Amazon.com.

Can You Share Your Amazon Vine Products that You Receive with Your Friends and Family Members?

As per the Amazon Vine Terms and Conditions, you may not sell or give possession of the products to any other person or entity for six months following your order.

The reason they do this is because sometimes you may have the ability to receive a product before it hits the general public and stores such as Target and Walmart. The companies that ship these products want to ensure that they have some reviews before hitting the general public which can help boost their sales and secondly, want to ensure their new products do not get into the wrong hands of someone who can perhaps steal their ideas and launch a similar product before they have the chance to do so.

How Does the Amazon Review Policy Work?

You should request items as your time permits that you can review thoroughly which will allow you to post an informed opinion on the item you are reviewing. Writing and crafting insightful reviews can be an extremely time consuming task and you do not want to fall behind on writing your reviews which can land you in Vine jail. If you are like me and like to read reviews before buying a product from Amazon, when you view a product that you are interested in buying and scroll down to the reviews of that specific product, you will know if it’s a paid review if it says “Vine Customer Review of Free Product” and next to the reviewer’s name it says “Vine Voice”.

I have written over 1000 reviews already since being in the program. It gets time consuming for sure and become more like a full time job on its own. It’s hard to believe you can write that many reviews but it just comes naturally because you can think of all types of use cases for each product.

For me personally, when I write reviews, I usually start with an example of my need for the product with one or two sentences, then just why I like the product another paragraph and that is enough to get them approved. They do get manually reviewed by amazon people to get approved so keep that in mind when you are writing your review.

What is Amazon Vine Jail?

If you are an Amazon member who get a good number of packages everyday like I do, you need to make sure you are keeping up with writing thoughtful and insightful reviews for those items. I know sometimes life gets in the way, but when you are an Amazon Vine Voice, you need to make sure you are keeping up with the requirements needed in order to stay an Amazon Vine Voice. If not, Amazon will slap the cuffs on your membership and throw you in Vine Jail.

Vine jail happens when you have less than 60% (previously 50%) of your Vine orders at all times. The new percentage went into effect January 4th 2024) to help weed out the users that do not take the time or effort to write their reviews within a timely manner. To remain or be upgraded to Amazon Vine’s Gold Tier, you need to write high quality reviews on at least 80 items (previously 100 items) and 90% of your Vine orders within the evaluation period stated on your Amazon Vine account page.

As a side note, Amazon will send you an “Update to Account Status” message in your Amazon Vine account as a courtesy warning to remind you to submit your reviews you have recently ordered within the last three months. Once you have reviewed 60% or more of your Amazon Vine recent orders for at least two weeks, the message will then be removed from your account.

While you are in Amazon Vine jail, you will not be able to see or order any new items from Amazon Vine AI or RFY lists. You can see and order items from AFA. I would be careful with this niceness by Amazon though as you do not want to fall behind even further. In order to get yourself out of Amazon Vine jail, you need to get your review count up above the threshold they require which is at least 60% of all of your Amazon Vine orders reviewed.

During this time you have approximately one month to get back up to speed or Amazon will give you the boot and kick you out of the program completely.

Amazon Vine Voice Membership Tiers

In October 2023, Amazon changed the Vine Voice program to classify its members into two tiers; silver or gold.

Amazon Vine Voice Silver Tier:

This is the base tier that all new members that get invited into Amazon Vine get bucketed into this program first. In this tier, you are allowed to order up to 3 items a day from products valued at $100 or less. To be upgraded to the gold tier, you must order at least 100 products and review at least 90% of your orders within your evaluation period stated on your Amazon Vine account page.

Amazon Vine Voice Gold Tier:

Amazon Vine Voice gold tier is Amazon’s premium tier of the Amazon Vine Voice program. This tier allows you to order up to 8 items per day with no limit on the value or cost of the item. To remain in this tier, you need to order at least 100 items and review at least 90% of your Amazon Vine orders within your evaluation period stated on your Amazon Vine account page.

What is the Amazon Vine Evaluation Period?

Your Amazon Vine evaluation period is the duration which your review contributions would be analyzed to determine if you meet the criteria of your Amazon Vine tier status.

Under your Amazon Vine Account Page, there is a section called “Your Vine Activity”. This is the section that is used for when your account is evaluated for staying in the program.

If you were an Amazon Vine Voice member before October 6, 2022, your evaluation period end date (also called your re-evaluation date) is randomly assigned from six to nine months out from your evaluation start date. After your first evaluation, all ongoing future evaluations will be set to six months from your last evaluation date.

Amazon Review Numbers and Percentage Reset

Once you complete your evaluation which usually takes a couple of days (could be sooner or later, there is no specific time period from Amazon), your review number count and percentage reset back to zero and you have to meet your numbers again during your new evaluation period.

One thing I would recommend is to stop ordering items at least two weeks before your evaluation period to allow review processing times on Amazon’s Customer Review Team. You want to ensure every item you are reviewing is counting towards your overall goal numbers for that evaluation period.

There are two important sections here that you need to monitor throughout your evaluation period:

1. “You have reviewed “x” of your Vine Items this period” which tracks the total reviews that have been submitted and approved by the Amazon Vine Customer Reviews Team within your evaluation period.
2. “You have reviewed “x%” of your Vine items this period” which tracks the total approved reviews as a percentage of total orders placed within the evaluation period.

Amazon Vine monitors Voice activity and has guardrails in place to avoid program misuse which ensures we deliver value to customers from this program.

How to know and Check the Exact Time Your Evaluation will Begin

To check the exact time of your Amazon Vine evaluation, you need to check and convert your epoch time to get the exact time of the day when your evaluation starts.

1. Go to Your Amazon Vine Account Page
2. On this page you will see your re-evaluation date
3. Copy the words Re-evaluation (CTRL + C) and then right click on the page and clicks “View Page Source” (or just go to this link here:  view-source: https://www.amazon.com/vine/account)
4. Press CTRL + F to initiate the search function
5. Paste (CTRL + V) to find where exactly in the code those words appear. If it doesn’t work, try searching without the “-” in reevaluation
6. You will see this in the code:
   • “TierStatusAction”:”TIER2_LEGACY_VOICES”
   • “acceptanceDate”:1658702648631
   • “statusEarnedDate”:1664991932095
   • “reevaluationDate”:1681407932095
   • “isTierEvaluationInProgress”:false
   • “voiceMemberShipStatus”:”ACTIVE”
7. Using the fourth bullet point (reevaluationDate), that is your epoch day and time of your re-evaluation.
8. Copy that reevaluationDate number and go to a site to convert it such as epochConverter.com and paste it into the field to convert those numbers into the exact time and day your re-evaluation will being

How Many Amazon Reviewers are there?

Amazon does not disclose the exact number of Amazon Vine Voice members, however it is estimated to be between 5- 10k. For example, there are a number of FaceBook groups dedicated solely to Amazon Vine members. One of the groups I am a part of has approximately 3,000 members currently. Now, are all of those users active Amazon Vine Voices? Probably not. We do not know how many of them are no longer in the Amazon Vine Review Program, how many of them are inactive (in Amazon Vine Jail, more on that later) or just users who got into the group somehow bypassing the security questions needed in order to get approval into the group.

There are also groups on Quora, Reddit and GoodReads.com as well. For me personally, I stick with the FaceBook Amazon Vine groups because you have a better shot of knowing who is in the group and who is not. You can definitely tell by the way people post things sometimes who is actually in the Vine program and who is not. Plus, most of the usual members in that group are also very helpful with answering any questions Vine members may have. It is a good starting place if you are new to the Amazon Vine program to get help from people who have been in the program for years and you can get many, if not all of your questions answered that you may have.

In order to get into the FaceBook group, you need to answer a series of questions but the hardest one by far is, “how many items does AI currently have”. You may be asking what AI is when it comes to Amazon Vine. More on that to come in the next section.

What are the Three Amazon Vine Lists?

If you are still reading this article up to this point, you have noticed there are a lot of acronyms being used. The most common ones you will come across when using Amazon Vine to request your products are three lists that are available for you to choose from which change on a daily basis. Those lists are:

RFY (Recommended for You)

This is where items drop that Amazon feels you would appreciate or benefit from. Items drop in this section throughout the day as Amazon releases and updates their AI lists. There are many good items you can find on this list but at the same time, items that may appear for you in RFY can also appear for someone else and if there is only a small amount of that item available, it could be gone before you have the ability to request it which it would then be removed from your RFY list, so it is important to check your RFY throughout the day quite frequently to ensure you are not missing out on a good brand/high value item.

Items in this list circulate throughout everyone’s RFY and no one decides to grab them, they are then moved over to AI or AFA usually a few weeks after. If you do decide not to take any items (or just a few) from your RFY, once Amazon stops dropping items for the day, those items in your RFY will start to be removed one by one until they are mostly gone before the new day starts over again and start populating with new items in your RFY. There are times if you have a good 40 items in your RFY, those items from the previous day will still be available the next day, depending on when they were added the day prior, but more than likely will be removed at some point throughout that next day as new items populate.

There is no rhyme or reason as to how Amazon recommends products to you in your RFY, but there has been speculation that it is based on a few factors that have to do with your search history on Amazon, items in your shopping cart or wish list, and your product view history. People have stated that they have put an item on their wish list and magically the next day or two, that product shows up in their RFY. I haven’t personally experienced this before. What I have experienced was viewing an item and the next day getting a similar item by a different no-name brand in my RFY. Not exactly what I originally wanted, but if the item was good enough, I would take it. It really comes down to the luck of the draw basically.

AFA (Available for All)

This is where you are going to find most of the good stuff. The good brand name products that appear on Amazon Vine that are shipped and sold by Amazon, will more than likely show up in this list when they drop items every day. Items that appear in AFA will also have a lower ETV on the brand name items that show up, usually because these items are sold and shipped by Amazon. You can find some really good items in AFA, but be forewarned, items on this list disappear faster than they appear which is normally within seconds of appearing in AFA. Some people spend all day just refreshing their computer screen on AFA waiting for items to drop and once they do, they are snatched up within seconds.

If you do see a good item in AFA and not sure if you want it or not, there is not much time to decide before it disappears. Usually what I do is, if it is an item that I know such as a brand name item that is very well known, I would usually just go ahead and request it as I know the item is going to be great just based on the brand, so I do not have the need to view the product listing. If you go that route by looking at the product listing, more than likely when you go back to Amazon Vine to request the product, it will already be gone.

For me personally, this is where I spend most of my time on Amazon Vine, because this is where you are going to find the “good stuff”. Some AFA brand items that drop in this list also have a 0 ETV depending on what the item is, such as diapers, food, health items, etc. These 0 ETV items go even quicker and usually within 1 or 2 seconds. So, if you have the time on your hands all day or are in the right place at the right time, you can score yourself some pretty sweet products.

One thing you also get to notice after you have been in Amazon Vine for a while when it comes to products dropping in AFA. It seems to me at least, that each day has its own theme. For example, one day of products dropping in AFA could be themed towards tools, and you may see all different kinds of tools dropping. On another day, it may be makeup day, meaning you would see a lot of different types of makeups dropping throughout the day. It is really weird but you do start to notice the patterns as you become more and more involved with Amazon Vine.

One thing I can say for sure which is a pattern that I see in AFA is that out of all of the brand name items that drop in AFA, there will be at least and only one or two big ticket items. Items that have ETV’s of hundreds of dollars. It is rare to see a continuous flow of high ETV brand name products throughout the day and once those one or two big ticket items are gone for the day, there is a slim chance that another big ticket item will appear.

Some of the well-known brands that drop on Amazon Vine are:

	Automotive	Baby Products	Beauty & Personal Care	Cleaning	Clothing	Electronics	Fragrance	Home	Groceries & Gourmet Food	Office	Pet Supplies	Shoes	Sports & Outdoors	Tools	Toys	Vacuums
AFA	Thule	4moms Baby Jogger BOB Gear Chicco Dr. Brown’s Evenflo Graco Joovy Regalo Hubble Connected	A|G Hair Covergirl EltaMD Innisfree Laneige Lanolips Sulwhasoo	Arm & Hammer	Amazon Aware Amazon Essentials Billabong GAP Jessica Simpson Levi’s Vera Bradley Calvin Klein Reebok Coach	Alienware Asus Dell Jabra Lenovo Logitech Meta/Facebook Razer Samsung Sony Vornado Crucial Netgear Linksys	Addidas	Genuine FRED Kohler LOLOI Rugs Rubbermaid	Bob’s Red Mill Ferrero Rocher Frank’s RedHot Goya Kelloggs	Hallmark Papyrus	Blue Buffalo Rachel Ray Caru Stella & Chewy Vital Essentials Blue Buffalo Purina Royal Canin Outward Hound Catstages	Merrell Nine West Vince Caputo Keen	Osprey Coleman	DeWalt	Barbie Fisher Price Lego Ravensburger	Dyson Shark Eufy
AI	ARB Auto		Benton Cocokind Eucerin Facetory Farmacy Hero Cosmetics Hyggee Jung Saem Mool KAJA KISS Cosmetics Lululun Medicube Milani Moonshot Moroccan Oil Naturium Neutrogena Not Your Mother’s Raw Sugar RITUALS Scinic Sol de Janeiro Suavecito Thank You Farmer TIA’M		Eddie Bauer Mountain Hardware Nautica Victoria’s Secret	Anker (Soundcore, Eufy) Brookstone Sharper Image	Lake & Skye	Honeywell Instant Pot Martha Stewart	Caraway Corkcicle		Reveal Bil-Jac Applaws Zesty Paws PetLab Co Flying Pig Shernbao Messy Mutt Jelly Pet Bark2Basic Spark Paws Blue K-9 Westpaw Solid Gold

AI (Additional Items)

This is where the majority of Amazon Vine items are located. Honestly, there is a lot of crap to sift through in order to find something worthwhile to request. Many of the items on this list are from third party companies that you probably never heard of. Mostly the items on this list are from companies that you would find on a site such as Alibaba.com which are mostly China based companies looking to get reviews on their products to help them with their sales. I am not saying you can find some gold nuggets in this list, but there is much more work that needs to be done on your part to find something good. Using the search bar on top of the page is probably your best bet. Searching for specific terms will yield a search results of all products from all lists that match that particular search term to help you narrow things down a bit.

I personally have found some good items in AI during both my Silver and Gold Amazon Vine member statuses. For example, when I was Silver, I found some great knives that I have bought in the past from the brand Dalstrong which makes some pretty awesome and expensive kitchen knives. I have even seen Caraway pots and pans show up in AI, so really it is just searching throughout the site to find some low hanging fruit but it is usually far and in between, but it does exist if you put the work into it.

What Time Do New Items Drop on Amazon Vine?

This is a question that is really hard to answer. There is no set time of the day when Amazon decides to drop new items in all of the lists, however, if you watch closely, you can decipher the patterns. For example, if you are on Amazon Vine almost every day (which most people are), then you tend to see when items drop throughout the day. That time of day that lasts for a couple of hours when they drop items, stays in place for a number of weeks. After a few weeks of items dropping around the same time of day, Amazon switches it up and changes the drop time which then continues for another couple of weeks before they change it again. I think they like to keep us on our toes but also think they change it up to give people a chance to snag some nice items so the same people are not getting all of the good stuff over and over again.

There is not an exact time, but if you figure out they start dropping items around 4PM, you can determine that the items in that drop would last until around 7PM more than likely. Items drop every few minutes or few seconds during their item drops. There is no clear indication how fast or how often items keep dropping. All you can do is keep refreshing and waiting for new items to show up in AFA if you are one of those people like me that just look for good brand name items to request.

Is it Okay to Cancel an Order for an Item You Requested?

Yes, it is possible to cancel an item you requested from Amazon Vine, if the item from the requested order has not been processed yet to be shipped. If you cancel the order in time, the ETV (if applicable), will be removed from your total year-end report and also be removed from your items to be reviewed page. There is a downside to cancelling an item on Amazon Vine as many have reported cancelling an item, but not being able to request anymore items for the rest of the day until the next day when everything resets. So take precaution when cancelling an order and do it when you only absolutely have no choice but to do so.

Understanding All of the Information You Just Consumed

If you made it this far down the article I applaud you. There is definitely a lot of information to consume and understand. Even I do not understand and know all of it. Some of these topics can get really in depth, especially when it comes to the tax stuff as each person’s situation is different. There is a lot more to Amazon Vine on the seller’s side that we did not go into that much either. On the surface though, you can see how Amazon Vine can be a beneficial program to be a part of and being part of this exclusive online program to me is comparable to hitting the lottery. Abide by Amazon Vine’s rules by staying on their good side, provide thoughtful insight to the products you are reviewing and you can be in the program for years to come.