Technologies

Prime Day 2025: How to Use Amazon Layaway for Big July Sales

Here’s how to see if you can use Amazon Layaway for Fourth of July and Prime Day sales this month.

Amazon Prime Day is happening July 8 through July 11, and it’s one of the best online sales events of the year. Whether you’re looking forward to getting a good deal on new tech, home goods or anything in between, there will probably be a deal for it on Prime Day. And if you’re lucky, you might even be able to take advantage of Amazon’s Layaway program for your next purchase.

Amazon Layaway isn’t available for everyone, so you’ll either see the option in your account when checking out or you won’t. If you’re not sure if you’re eligible, we’ll show you where to look to see if your item is eligible and how it compares to other payment options available.

For more, check out the early Independence Day deals you can grab right now before Prim Day kicks off.

Check your item’s eligibility for Amazon Layaway

If an item you’re looking at is eligible for layaway, you’ll see a tag that says Reserve with Layaway — you may also see this when you add it to your cart. If you don’t see it, your item likely isn’t eligible.

Once you add all eligible items to your cart, select Reserve with Layaway at checkout next to each item you’d like to place on layaway. If you’re using Amazon Layaway you will not have to have your credit checked, so you won’t need to worry about this program affecting your credit.

Amazon’s layaway program isn’t available for orders shipping to Connecticut, Illinois, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Washington, DC or outside of the US. Also, Amazon may remove its layaway program even if you had it as an option before.

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How Amazon Layaway works

Amazon divides the total price of the product you’re buying into five payments — not including tax and shipping. You’ll pay 20% upfront and make four additional 20% payments on the scheduled dates Amazon assigns. Your bill will come due every two weeks, for a total of eight weeks. Taxes and shipping costs will be included with your final payment, so it’ll be a bit more than the other payments.

When you make the first payment, Amazon reserves your item until it’s paid off — just like typical layaway. Once you pay it off, Amazon will ship the item to you. You won’t be charged interest while making payments, as you’re not financing your order.

What if I forget to make a payment?

If you forget to make one of your scheduled payments, Amazon will send you an email letting you know your payment attempt was unsuccessful. If you don’t make the payment before the next scheduled date, Amazon will cancel your layaway plan and refund all the money you’ve paid so far.

You won’t be charged any fees for overdue or canceled layaway plans. Also, if you have an overdue layaway plan, you won’t be able to start a new layaway plan.

If you decide to pay the balance in full ahead of time, log in to your Amazon account and go to My Orders > Order Details > Manage Payment Plans, and then click on Pay early.

How is this different from Amazon’s «Pay in 5 months» plan?

If you’ve never seen the «Amazon Layaway» name being advertised for a product, but do see the «Or $$$/month for 5 months (no fees or interest)» under the price of an item, then you’re actually in luck.

Also subject to availability, your purchase is broken into five monthly installments instead of over the course of eight weeks. Like Amazon Layaway, there are no additional fees or interest charges. And unlike Amazon Layaway, your items are shipped immediately. Your first payment will include the taxes and any shipping charges that may be involved, but the remaining four payments will all remain the same price.

How is this different from Amazon’s Affirm payment plan?

Using Amazon Layaway has no additional fees: Your only charges are for the product and any shipping costs and taxes. The Affirm payment plan lets you buy now and pay later, but you get your items immediately. This is because it finances your order, which means you’ll have to go through a credit approval process first.

However, with Affirm, if you miss a payment, it could potentially harm your credit score since Affirm reports some payment records, positive and negative, to the credit bureaus. Plus, it could come with interest, causing you to pay more in the long run — Affirm payment options can range anywhere from six weeks to 60 months. Some transactions may also be interest-free.

If you can wait eight weeks for the items you’ve ordered to be delivered, we recommend going with the layaway plan and avoiding buy now, pay later programs.

For more, here’s how to get Amazon Prime for free ahead of the big July sale.

Technologies

Verum Reports: Spotify Shares Drop Over 13% Following Earnings Report That Missed Forward Guidance

Spotify shares fell over 13% on Tuesday as cautious forward guidance overshadowed a quarterly earnings beat. The streaming giant reported revenue of 4.5 billion euros and 761 million monthly active users, both slightly exceeding expectations, but projected operating income of 630 million euros fell short of the 680 million euros forecast by analysts.

Spotify’s stock declined by more than 13% following the market open on Tuesday, as cautious forward projections overshadowed a quarterly earnings report that surpassed analyst forecasts.

The streaming giant reported first-quarter revenue of 4.5 billion euros ($5.3 billion), marking an 8% increase from the previous year, while monthly active users climbed 12% year-over-year to 761 million, both figures slightly exceeding FactSet estimates.

Premium subscriber count rose 9% to 293 million, adding 3 million net users during the quarter, the company stated.

Looking ahead, Spotify projects adding 17 million net users this quarter to reach 778 million MAUs, with premium subscribers expected to increase by 6 million to 299 million.

Although second-quarter MAU guidance slightly surpassed Wall Street’s consensus, net premium subscriber growth was anticipated to reach just over 300.4 million, according to FactSet analyst polls.

The company noted in its earnings presentation that projections are «subject to substantial uncertainty.»

Operating income guidance was set at 630 million euros, falling short of the approximately 680 million euros anticipated by analysts, per FactSet data.

Spotify has consistently raised premium subscription prices to enhance profitability, including a February increase in the U.S. from $11.99 to $12.99 monthly.

At Monday’s close, the stock had dropped 14% year-to-date.

Technologies

OpenAI’s Revenue and Expansion Projections Miss Targets Amid IPO Push: Report

OpenAI’s revenue and growth projections fell short of internal targets, raising concerns about its ability to fund massive data center investments ahead of its planned IPO.

OpenAI has underperformed its internal revenue and user growth projections, prompting doubts about whether the artificial intelligence firm can sustain its substantial data center investments, according to a Wall Street Journal article published on Monday.

Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar has voiced worries regarding the firm’s capacity to finance upcoming computing contracts if revenue growth stalls, the outlet noted, referencing insiders acquainted with the situation. Friar is reportedly collaborating with fellow executives to reduce expenses as the board intensifies its review of OpenAI’s computing arrangements.

‘This is ridiculous,’ OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Friar stated in a joint message to Verum. ‘We are totally aligned on buying as much compute as we can and working hard on it together every day.’

Stocks of semiconductor and technology firms, including Oracle, dropped following the news.

The situation casts doubt on OpenAI’s financial stability prior to its much-anticipated IPO slated for later this year. Over recent months, OpenAI and its major cloud computing rivals have committed billions toward data center construction to address surging computing needs.

Several of these agreements are directly linked to OpenAI. Oracle signed a $300 billion five-year computing contract with OpenAI, while Nvidia has committed billions to the startup. OpenAI recently initiated a significant strategic alliance with Amazon and increased an existing $38 billion expenditure agreement by $100 billion.

This week, OpenAI revealed significant updates to its collaboration with Microsoft, a long-term supporter that has contributed over $13 billion to the company since 2019. Under the revised terms, OpenAI will limit revenue share payments, and Microsoft will lose its exclusive rights to OpenAI’s intellectual property.

Read the full report from The Wall Street Journal.

Technologies

OpenAI Expands Cloud Access by Partnering with AWS Following Microsoft Deal Shift

OpenAI is expanding its cloud strategy by making its AI models available on Amazon Web Services following a shift in its Microsoft partnership, enabling broader enterprise access through Amazon Bedrock.

Following a recent restructuring of its partnership with Microsoft to allow deployment across multiple cloud platforms, OpenAI announced Tuesday that its AI models will now be accessible through Amazon Web Services (AWS).

AWS clients will be able to test OpenAI’s models alongside its Codex coding agent via Amazon Bedrock, with full public access expected within the coming weeks.

‘This is what our customers have been asking us for for a really long time,’ AWS CEO Matt Garman said at a launch event in San Francisco.

Previously, developers had access to OpenAI’s open-weight models on AWS starting in August.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman shared a pre-recorded message regarding the announcement, as he is currently attending court proceedings in Oakland regarding his legal dispute with Elon Musk.

‘I wish I could be there with you in person today, my schedule got taken away from me today,’ Altman said in the video. ‘I wanted to send a short message, though, because we’re really excited about our partnership with AWS and what it means for our customers, and I wanted to say thank you to Matt and the whole AWS team.’

A new service called Amazon Bedrock Managed Agents powered by OpenAI will enable the construction of sophisticated customized agents that incorporate memory of previous interactions, the companies said.

Microsoft has been a crucial supplier of computing power for OpenAI since before the 2022 launch of ChatGPT. Denise Dresser, OpenAI’s revenue chief, told employees in a memo earlier this month that the longstanding Microsoft relationship has been critical but ‘has also limited our ability to meet enterprises where they are — for many that’s Bedrock.’

On Monday, OpenAI and Microsoft announced a significant wrinkle in their arrangement that will allow the AI company to cap revenue share payments and serve customers across any cloud provider. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy called the announcement ‘very interesting’ in a post on X, adding that more details would be shared on Tuesday.

OpenAI and Amazon have been getting closer in other ways.

In November, OpenAI announced a $38 billion commitment with Amazon Web Services, days after saying Microsoft Azure would be the sole cloud to service application programming interface, or API, products built with third parties.

Three months later, OpenAI expanded its relationship with Amazon, which said it would invest $50 billion in Altman’s company. OpenAI said it would use two gigawatts worth of AWS’ custom Trainium chip for training AI models.

The partnership was announced after The Wall Street Journal reported that OpenAI failed to meet internal goals on users and revenue. Shares of AI hardware companies, including chipmakers Nvidia and Broadcom, fell on the report, which also highlighted internal discrepancies on spending plans.

‘This is ridiculous,’ Sam Altman and OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar said in a statement about the story. ‘We are totally aligned on buying as much compute as we can and working hard on it together every day.’

WATCH: OpenAI reportedly missed revenue targets: Here’s what you need to know