What changed
Free self-service portal to enroll a web store in Amazon Shop Direct and Buy for Me
When
Launched November 4, 2026
Who it affects
Eligible US merchants with their own web store, including Amazon sellers for items not sold on Amazon
What to do
Search Amazon for your brand, decide which SKUs to include, connect your existing feed

Key takeaways

  • Amazon launched a free self-serve Shop Direct Merchant Workspace on November 4, 2026, so any eligible US web store can feed products into Amazon search and Alexa for Shopping.
  • No Amazon fee is listed, but shoppers leave Amazon to buy, so conversion, not fees, decides whether it pays.
  • Search Amazon for your brand first: some stores were listed without asking earlier in 2026.

How Shop Direct got here

  1. Amazon launches Shop Direct for outside stores

  2. Brands report listings added without asking

  3. Feedonomics added as a feed integration

  4. Free self-serve Merchant Workspace launches

  5. Black Friday: first peak with self-serve enrollment

What Amazon launched

Shop Direct shows products that Amazon does not stock in its own store inside regular search results, labelled "Shop Direct". A shopper taps the button, sees a notice that they are leaving Amazon, and buys on the merchant's own site. For eligible items, Amazon's Buy for Me tool goes one step further: the shopper confirms details on Amazon and Amazon's AI completes the purchase on the merchant's website. Amazon first launched Shop Direct in February 2025, according to PYMNTS.

The new Merchant Workspace turns enrollment into a self-serve process with three steps: create a Shop Direct merchant account, verify your business website, and share your catalog. Catalogs can come from feed providers Feedonomics, Salsify, CEDCommerce and VersaFeed, or from a direct integration with the Selling Partner API and the Shop Direct API. Amazon says the portal accepts widely used shopping feed formats, so the feed you already built for other shopping channels can be reused, and it shows which products are active.

Amazon says there are no fees to participate, merchants choose which items to include and can opt out at any time. The merchant keeps control of pricing, inventory, shipping, returns and customer service. Amazon sellers can also apply, for products they do not currently sell on Amazon, by emailing shopdirect@amazon.com.

The numbers Amazon gave

Amazon says tens of millions of customers have discovered hundreds of millions of unique products from other stores through Shop Direct since it launched, and that Shop Direct products appear in hundreds of millions of searches each month. An earlier Amazon page on the program cited more than 100 million products from more than 400,000 merchants. Commerce.com, which owns Feedonomics, said on the same day that its integration is available to eligible US customers only.

Amazon also has the shopper's attention at checkout. A PYMNTS Intelligence survey cited in its coverage found Amazon accounts for 49% of main purchase completions and 59% of the most recent AI assisted purchases. That is the audience a small web store can now reach without opening a Seller Central account.

What most coverage misses: the opt-out problem behind the portal

In January 2026, Modern Retail reported that small brands found their catalogs listed on Amazon through Buy for Me without having asked. One children's clothing shop said about 4,000 of its products appeared and it received around 16 orders before it realised they came from Amazon, and other owners raised wholesale pricing and sales tax worries. Amazon called the programs tests and said businesses could opt out by emailing branddirect@amazon.com.

The Workspace answers part of that complaint: merchants can now see and choose what is live. What the November announcement does not say is whether Amazon will keep adding stores that never registered. Until it does, treat "check what Amazon already shows for my brand" as step one, whether or not you plan to join. Our Alexa for Shopping guide explains how these listings also surface in voice and AI answers.

So what: the math for one product

For example, using illustrative numbers: a brand sells a $40 product. Through FBA it might pay a 15% referral fee ($6.00) plus a fulfillment fee of about $6.50, so roughly $12.50 goes to Amazon and the brand keeps $27.50 before product cost and ads. Through Shop Direct, Amazon lists no fee, but the brand pays its own shipping (say $7.00) and card processing (about 3%, or $1.20), keeping about $31.80, which is $4.30 more per order.

The catch is conversion. A shopper who must leave Amazon converts less often than one who can click Buy Now with Prime. If 100 Shop Direct clicks convert at 3% instead of the 10% the same product might reach as an FBA listing, the brand makes 3 orders instead of 10, and the extra $4.30 per order does not make up for 7 lost sales. Buy for Me narrows that gap, because the shopper never leaves Amazon, but you then ship to a customer who expects Amazon level speed and returns.

One $40 product, two routes (illustrative)

FBA listingShop Direct
Amazon feesAbout $12.50$0 listed
Your shipping costIncluded in FBAAbout $7.00
Kept per orderAbout $27.50About $31.80
CheckoutBuy Now on AmazonYour own site
Returns handled byAmazonYou

What sellers should do

Most of this is a one week job for whoever owns ecommerce and the product feed.

  • Ecommerce lead: search the Amazon app for your brand name and your top five products and note any Shop Direct or Buy for Me results, including wrong photos or prices. Metric: a dated list of every listing Amazon shows for your brand.
  • Founder or channel lead: decide per SKU whether Amazon traffic should go to your site, to your FBA listing, or nowhere. Wholesale only, password protected and retailer exclusive items should stay out. Metric: a written include and exclude list.
  • Feed owner: if you join, register at shopdirect.amazon.com, verify the site and connect the feed you already use for other channels through your provider. Metric: active product count in the Workspace matches your include list.
  • Ops lead: tag orders that arrive from Amazon referrals or Buy for Me in your store platform and check that your returns policy and shipping speed hold up. Metric: Shop Direct orders, return rate and on time delivery in your weekly report.
  • Finance lead: compare contribution margin per order from Shop Direct with the same product through FBA or Amazon's multichannel tools. Metric: margin per order and orders per 100 visits by channel after 30 days.
  • Amazon seller with rivals off Amazon: watch your top keywords for Shop Direct results from competitors that do not sell on Amazon. Metric: weekly count of Shop Direct listings on page one of your main search terms.

When this does not apply

Shop Direct is available to US customers, and the Feedonomics integration is limited to eligible US merchants, so brands selling only outside the US cannot use it yet. If every product you make is already sold on Amazon through FBA, Shop Direct adds little, because Amazon's own listing will usually win the click. Brands bound by retailer exclusivity or minimum advertised price agreements should check contracts before letting Amazon show their site prices.

If you want help deciding how Amazon fits next to your own store, our Shopify and DTC team works across both, and a free Amazon audit shows where your brand already appears. More updates are on the Shopify and ecommerce news channel.

Sources

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