How to get free stuff on Amazon without an Amazon Prime membership

Amazon makes thousands of its Kindle books available for free to everyone (even non-Prime members).

If you happen to be an Amazon Prime member, you get to download one free Kindle book per month in the Amazon First Reads program. And that's not all: You can "borrow" up to 10 titles at a time — which includes both books and magazines — with Amazon Prime Reading.

But even if you're not a Prime member, just go to the Kindle store, search for "free," and then use the genre browsing tools on the left side of the page to sort for free books you might like.

There's so much free and nearly free music online these days (Spotify has a free ad-supported player, for example) that it hardly seems worth mentioning, but if you're a music lover, you shouldn't pass up the free tracks on tap at Amazon.

If you're a Prime subscriber, you get access to Amazon Music Prime, and that includes 2 million tracks (the more comprehensive Amazon Music Unlimited has 50 million tracks for an additional cost). But regardless of whether you are a Prime member, you can download and listen to thousands of free songs at Amazon Music.

This promotion might not last forever — in fact, it's already down from a $109 bonus offered a few months ago — but you can get a $5 Amazon credit when you sign up for Amazon Cash and charge the account with $20. Amazon Cash is a program that lets you add money to your Amazon balance by buying Amazon gift cards at a large number of retail locations around the country. It's aimed at customers who don't want to use a credit card or debit card online.

If you've never heard of Amazon Vine, don't worry — most people haven't. But if you like to write product reviews on Amazon, you should be aware of Vine, which awards free products to members in exchange for honest and accurate reviews.

Unfortunately, Amazon Vine is by invitation only — you can't even apply for consideration. But Amazon keeps an eye on prolific reviewers, and sometimes reaches out to offer them an opportunity to join the Vine program. You can read about the Amazon Vine program and learn ways to improve your reputation as a reviewer on Amazon.

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