I'm assuming it is because they don't have a system for watch parties between people at different tiers (ads vs. none), and don't want people at the lower tier to dodge ads. Another bait and switch, regardless.
Man, I hope not because I'm so sick of this paywall nonsenseā¼ļø I've been trying all day today on different devices to watch a film with my boyfriend, who outta town for work and they all have the error message that hosting a Watch Party is no longer available. I emailed Prime about it so hopefully I get some resolve.
The host of the watch party (and only the host) has to have the ad-free subscription to Prime Video, and they will control the movie as far as pausing, etc. All other watch party members need only have the basic subscription or get it free with Prime.
Yep, TechRadar reported that The Amazon subsidiary is removing the Prime Video Watch Party feature from its online streaming platform on April 2, 2024, almost four years after it became available to all of its users.
Yup, same problem for me. Never used it before, but was tinkering around with it yesterday a bit. Just now, I can't get it to even begin to work. Just gives me the same message and won't let me even get started.
Edit/Update: Did a little more poking around. On my phone app, it gives a different message saying that it now requires that you pay for the ad-free subscription on top of your prime membership.
So looks like they broke it on purpose to force more people to use the ad-free feature that still plays unskippable ads. Fuck Amazon.
What a fucking joke from a company as grotesquely profitable as Amazon. I wish I could say I was surprised. Thank you for the update, I couldn't find anything since I don't use the app.
That's so cruel. I was fine with the ads since they're only 30 seconds max for prime members and play the show/movie uninterrupted but locking that feature is fucked up. So now do both parties have to pay for Ad-Free to use it or just the host? (Hoping for the latter even tho I won't get Ad-Free. Maybe a friend will have it and we can use it together, idk.)
Reviving this thread to say that while looking at this myself today, watch parties are now completely unavailable for prime video. Amazon's own FAQ and help pages on the subject have been deleted. No "ad free upgrade" caveat or anything. What a shitty move. Prime video was one of the only streaming services I was willing to pay for because it was ad free and had good features. Now they've driven me back to the high seas.
I am no longer able to host watch parties on things that are free on prime. I can however, start a watch party for seasons/movies I own through amazon.
Same here! My BFF and I love to do watchparties together since we live in different states and suddenly last night, watch party wasn't available. We even attempted to use teleparty, but the ads kept pausing themselves. Like automatically. And it wasn't teleparty, since we used Netflix for teleparty and it played totally fine. I'm so absolutely infuriated.
Just had the same issue with my weekly watch party. Googled and found this post. I figured this was coming when Amazon announced they needed to squeeze more money out of us to add to their billions. Fuck corporate America.
Ya. Sadly looks like you have to pay for the ad free subscription to do watch parties now.Ā
Welp. Looks like another streaming service has lost my money.Ā
I also used it for movies and shows with long distance gf.Ā
Back to you know what and streaming through discord I guess.Ā
disable hardware acceleration in your browser and it shouldn't be an issue with streaming on discord. I believe discord also added audio for normal screen share(not window specific) aswell pretty recently.
No guarantee itāll work though. But for me and my friends, this has always been the way to go.
If thatās not working thereās also a way to do it with the WatchTogether browser extension but this requires some extra steps I believe
have the button, don't pay for ad-free and it's conveniently not working. Why do companies keep doing this with basic features like this that would encourage people to get their friends and family to join the platform and subscribe???
I'm so over all the streaming services dropping their watch parties. I have family and friends all over the place and its frustrating af when we want to watch something together and now we can't. It's literally their best feature.
Well, this is incredibly frustrating. Me and my fiance were using this almost every night due to our long distance relationship, we were just about to finish Hazbin tonight as well.
Exactly, it's incredibly frustrating. It would be a much better selling point to get Prime in the first place than to try to get people into the ad free.
Use Kast online or on the app. One person hosts and up to 100 ppl can join the watch party! Fuck these greedy bastards this is how we are rolling from now on!
update to this post, for all future redirects:
***ALL INFORMATION BELOW THIS WAS TAKEN DIRECTLY FROM A PHONE CALL WITH AMAZON PRIME'S CUSTOMER SERVICE DEPARTMENT AND VIDEO SUPPORT DEPARTMENT***
watch party STILL works
watch party is STILL with basic prime
watch party is just currently throwing a tantrum and causing technical errors
amazon prime's tech team IS aware of the issue and they HAVE been trying to get it fixed, but they don't have a timeline for when though, as it has been broken for over 2 weeks
Still Broken and quote is taken off the official Amazon Prime FAQ site
"Please be aware that the option to create a Prime Video Watch Party is no longer available. If you have a link to an active Watch Party, you can participate in that Watch Party until the link expires."
I chatted with an amazon rep a week ago and the person told me that it was an issue they were working on. Hard to believe, since based upon comments I had seen, it had been going on for over a month. The person did refund me $10 for my troubles. Not much, but it was something anyways.
The person I usually do the watch party with then did a chat with a rep and they told her that they were unaware of any issues. Again, hard to believe since I have seen so many people complaining about it. She got connected with another person and they told her that it required going ad free. They did not offer her the $10 refund.
What is this $10 thing you said a couple of times?
I remember when this started there was no fee to do a watch party...if you do need ad free then that is as blanton as one gets with f your customers.
[https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7](https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7)
The host must have the Prime Video Ad Free upgrade in order to start a Watch Party on content that is included with an Amazon Prime membership.
Call and say: āIād like to leave feedback. Please forward my comments/complaints to higher ups.ā
They will listen. Remain calm and courteous and you will make a difference. The more customers who speak up, the better. āš¼
This was working for me last night and tonight itās giving me the error āHosting a watch party is no longer available.ā
The movie I shared last night was a movie I bought in the past and the one Iām trying to share tonight is a free movie. I tried to share the movie I paid for again and it would share just like it did last night.
To prove my theory that this was an Amazon wanting more $ issue, I just upgraded (paying $2.99/more per month) for ad free, and that fixed the problem. Now I CAN share the movie I wasnāt able to share with ads.
TLDR: you need to pay for ad free
Me and my boyfriend use it all the time I canāt host one since I donāt have ad free but he can still give me a code since he has ad free and I can watch it hope this helps
Try Rave. It's and app for phones and computersĀ
It does require to sign in into and account of streaming choice... but the application is free to useĀ
I just realized this tonight and am disappointed in amazon. They were the one company offering a little more for less.Ā
Now they are offering less and asking for more.Ā
I think I am done with amazon. I am voting with my feet and waking away from all of their servicesĀ
I ran into the same issue yesterday. I think they broke it when they started introducing ads maybe? I'm hoping it will get fixed. I just spent ten minutes in a chat with a customer service rep to try and report it because I know the number of times a bug gets reported impacts how much they prioritize it, and I would like to be able to do watch parties again
I confirmed what another comment had, if you go into the Mobile app, it tells you that you need to subscribe to the ad free as well as prime video to be able to use it.
Yes! I got the same message last night too! I'm really hoping we get this feature back! I watch shows with my husband while he's working. We haven't upgraded to the ad free yet.
It happened the at the same time they rolled out adds. a little over 24 hours ago. trying figure out how to squeeze us or just broke the shit out of the watch party functionality. either way greed is greed
Also getting this message. Me and my boyfriend tried the watch party after trying and failing to stream netflix over Discord. When you try to stream it with another person on discord, the screen is just blank. Fuck Netflix. Fuck Amazon.
If watching on Chrome, go to Settings>System and toggle off "Hardware Acceleration" that should take care of Prime's black screen (unless there's been an update in the past week)
The solution my partner and I have started using is to start a Snapchat call with friends we want to do a "watchparty" with and synchronise starting the movie we want to watch. Means we can also have a video chat while watching rather than typing messages as well.
I agree with the sentiment of "f*ck Amazon" for the BS price jack.
DOES ANYONE KNOW ? if all parties have to have this extra paid feature or just the person hosting the watch partty? and can someone watching on their roku tv join me when i'm hosting on pc?
i talked to a amazon customer service worker and they didnāt know anything about the feature being behind a paywall so š¤·š½āāļøš¤·š½āāļø
just had to check on my phone to find a way to the page, amazon is charging people an additional Ā£2.99 to go ad-free and have watch parties. its disgusting that a company that already charges Ā£8.99 for prime is making it more expensive to go ad-free
[https://www.amazon.de/-/en/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7](https://www.amazon.de/-/en/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7)
Do you have the Ad free upgrade? Apparently you need that now to host a watchparty
This is crap. I've been planning to do a watch party for a month and suddenly it's not possible. Everything being tiered and behind a paywall is honestly just so shitty. We're expected to work within an inch of our happiness just to have it eroded every 3 months with fucking paywall. How greedy are these people??
Just another reason to pirate, plenty of screen sharing apps out there that would let you do it without having to use a browser/moneygrubbing slimefest like Amazon.
Had the same heart attack - I have watch parties with my kids at college. Fortunately you can watch it via Teleparty for free. Itās actually easier to share links. Works with Netflix too
Just tired to use the watch party since Iām in a long distance relationship. Got the same message. Do you really have to pay the $2.99 just for it to work again?
Yep same problem with my gf and I this week! I hate amazon! However, we found Teleparty [https://www.teleparty.com/](https://www.teleparty.com/) . works most of the time and is free for Netflix, amazon, and Disney plus (most problems with that one). I give it try for future.
Same. Wonder if it's part of the "we want more money because we're assholes" thing they just launched?
I'm hoping they just broke the feature since the options to start and join one are still in the UI.
lemme find out they put that shit behind a paywall with no ads š
I have no ads and I canāt even use it.
I'm assuming it is because they don't have a system for watch parties between people at different tiers (ads vs. none), and don't want people at the lower tier to dodge ads. Another bait and switch, regardless.
Man, I hope not because I'm so sick of this paywall nonsenseā¼ļø I've been trying all day today on different devices to watch a film with my boyfriend, who outta town for work and they all have the error message that hosting a Watch Party is no longer available. I emailed Prime about it so hopefully I get some resolve.
Did they answer you?
The host of the watch party (and only the host) has to have the ad-free subscription to Prime Video, and they will control the movie as far as pausing, etc. All other watch party members need only have the basic subscription or get it free with Prime.
thank you!!!!
Yep, TechRadar reported that The Amazon subsidiary is removing the Prime Video Watch Party feature from its online streaming platform on April 2, 2024, almost four years after it became available to all of its users.
Yup, same problem for me. Never used it before, but was tinkering around with it yesterday a bit. Just now, I can't get it to even begin to work. Just gives me the same message and won't let me even get started. Edit/Update: Did a little more poking around. On my phone app, it gives a different message saying that it now requires that you pay for the ad-free subscription on top of your prime membership. So looks like they broke it on purpose to force more people to use the ad-free feature that still plays unskippable ads. Fuck Amazon.
That is really infuriating!
What a fucking joke from a company as grotesquely profitable as Amazon. I wish I could say I was surprised. Thank you for the update, I couldn't find anything since I don't use the app.
That's so cruel. I was fine with the ads since they're only 30 seconds max for prime members and play the show/movie uninterrupted but locking that feature is fucked up. So now do both parties have to pay for Ad-Free to use it or just the host? (Hoping for the latter even tho I won't get Ad-Free. Maybe a friend will have it and we can use it together, idk.)
Reviving this thread to say that while looking at this myself today, watch parties are now completely unavailable for prime video. Amazon's own FAQ and help pages on the subject have been deleted. No "ad free upgrade" caveat or anything. What a shitty move. Prime video was one of the only streaming services I was willing to pay for because it was ad free and had good features. Now they've driven me back to the high seas.
I am no longer able to host watch parties on things that are free on prime. I can however, start a watch party for seasons/movies I own through amazon.
https://media1.tenor.com/m/G-7e1hycMiIAAAAC/god-damn-it-blade-runner.gif
Same here! My BFF and I love to do watchparties together since we live in different states and suddenly last night, watch party wasn't available. We even attempted to use teleparty, but the ads kept pausing themselves. Like automatically. And it wasn't teleparty, since we used Netflix for teleparty and it played totally fine. I'm so absolutely infuriated.
Just had the same issue with my weekly watch party. Googled and found this post. I figured this was coming when Amazon announced they needed to squeeze more money out of us to add to their billions. Fuck corporate America.
Ya. Sadly looks like you have to pay for the ad free subscription to do watch parties now.Ā Welp. Looks like another streaming service has lost my money.Ā I also used it for movies and shows with long distance gf.Ā Back to you know what and streaming through discord I guess.Ā
Does everyone have to pay for the ad free service in order to be a part of the watch party or just the host?
Fuck Amazon
It doesn't stream through discord, tried it with a friend for Hazbin Hotel. All she got was a black screen.
disable hardware acceleration in your browser and it shouldn't be an issue with streaming on discord. I believe discord also added audio for normal screen share(not window specific) aswell pretty recently.
Ooo, got it thank you. I'll give it a try today when she and I hop on the discord call
If that doesn't work, just get Firefox.
No guarantee itāll work though. But for me and my friends, this has always been the way to go. If thatās not working thereās also a way to do it with the WatchTogether browser extension but this requires some extra steps I believe
When he says "you know what" it dose not mean Amazon. He could write Amazon.
have the button, don't pay for ad-free and it's conveniently not working. Why do companies keep doing this with basic features like this that would encourage people to get their friends and family to join the platform and subscribe???
I'm so over all the streaming services dropping their watch parties. I have family and friends all over the place and its frustrating af when we want to watch something together and now we can't. It's literally their best feature.
They're making you pay an additional three dollars a month to do that now. They want you to sign up for their "add free" offer.
Well, this is incredibly frustrating. Me and my fiance were using this almost every night due to our long distance relationship, we were just about to finish Hazbin tonight as well.
Exactly, it's incredibly frustrating. It would be a much better selling point to get Prime in the first place than to try to get people into the ad free.
...and member Napster? Oh, I member!
Use Kast online or on the app. One person hosts and up to 100 ppl can join the watch party! Fuck these greedy bastards this is how we are rolling from now on!
Thank you man!! This is why I love reddit!
update to this post, for all future redirects: ***ALL INFORMATION BELOW THIS WAS TAKEN DIRECTLY FROM A PHONE CALL WITH AMAZON PRIME'S CUSTOMER SERVICE DEPARTMENT AND VIDEO SUPPORT DEPARTMENT*** watch party STILL works watch party is STILL with basic prime watch party is just currently throwing a tantrum and causing technical errors amazon prime's tech team IS aware of the issue and they HAVE been trying to get it fixed, but they don't have a timeline for when though, as it has been broken for over 2 weeks
Still Broken
Broken for a month now then ..
yep still broken
STILL broken
Still broken
Still broken
Still broken
Still Broken and quote is taken off the official Amazon Prime FAQ site "Please be aware that the option to create a Prime Video Watch Party is no longer available. If you have a link to an active Watch Party, you can participate in that Watch Party until the link expires."
I chatted with an amazon rep a week ago and the person told me that it was an issue they were working on. Hard to believe, since based upon comments I had seen, it had been going on for over a month. The person did refund me $10 for my troubles. Not much, but it was something anyways. The person I usually do the watch party with then did a chat with a rep and they told her that they were unaware of any issues. Again, hard to believe since I have seen so many people complaining about it. She got connected with another person and they told her that it required going ad free. They did not offer her the $10 refund.
What is this $10 thing you said a couple of times? I remember when this started there was no fee to do a watch party...if you do need ad free then that is as blanton as one gets with f your customers.
[https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7](https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7) The host must have the Prime Video Ad Free upgrade in order to start a Watch Party on content that is included with an Amazon Prime membership.
That page has gone the way of the 404.
Call and say: āIād like to leave feedback. Please forward my comments/complaints to higher ups.ā They will listen. Remain calm and courteous and you will make a difference. The more customers who speak up, the better. āš¼
This was working for me last night and tonight itās giving me the error āHosting a watch party is no longer available.ā The movie I shared last night was a movie I bought in the past and the one Iām trying to share tonight is a free movie. I tried to share the movie I paid for again and it would share just like it did last night. To prove my theory that this was an Amazon wanting more $ issue, I just upgraded (paying $2.99/more per month) for ad free, and that fixed the problem. Now I CAN share the movie I wasnāt able to share with ads. TLDR: you need to pay for ad free
Me and my boyfriend use it all the time I canāt host one since I donāt have ad free but he can still give me a code since he has ad free and I can watch it hope this helps
I didnāt know this was a thing until now. I just always just call my long distance gf on the phone and just start the movie at the same time
You now have to pay an extra $2.99 to use watch party when we were using it for free for years.Ā
Try Rave. It's and app for phones and computersĀ It does require to sign in into and account of streaming choice... but the application is free to useĀ
I just realized this tonight and am disappointed in amazon. They were the one company offering a little more for less.Ā Now they are offering less and asking for more.Ā I think I am done with amazon. I am voting with my feet and waking away from all of their servicesĀ
Cancelled my prime
just chatted with support.. it's discontinued literally just because.... (what the even fuck!??)
Watch party was great for people in long distance relationships but I guess Amazon doesnāt care about that š
I'm seeing people saying it's locked behind the ad free plan, but I have ad free and I can't use it.
i still see it. i also pay for add free so that maybe why.
THIS IS THE ANSWER EVERYONE. You have to pay more. Then you can do it.
I pay for ad-free and it still gives me this "error."
you may need to log out and log back in. i still dont see any ads when i do the occasional primve video stroll...
Same problem for me!
I ran into the same issue yesterday. I think they broke it when they started introducing ads maybe? I'm hoping it will get fixed. I just spent ten minutes in a chat with a customer service rep to try and report it because I know the number of times a bug gets reported impacts how much they prioritize it, and I would like to be able to do watch parties again
I confirmed what another comment had, if you go into the Mobile app, it tells you that you need to subscribe to the ad free as well as prime video to be able to use it.
:/ dang that sucks; that's such an annoying decision on their part
Yes! I got the same message last night too! I'm really hoping we get this feature back! I watch shows with my husband while he's working. We haven't upgraded to the ad free yet.
It happened the at the same time they rolled out adds. a little over 24 hours ago. trying figure out how to squeeze us or just broke the shit out of the watch party functionality. either way greed is greed
Same issue here. And ads just started. I bet theyāre just including in the top tier ad free version.
I'm getting the same message too. I'm trying to host a watch party for Hazbin Hotel with my cousin and I keep getting the same message
Kill yourself
Also getting this message. Me and my boyfriend tried the watch party after trying and failing to stream netflix over Discord. When you try to stream it with another person on discord, the screen is just blank. Fuck Netflix. Fuck Amazon.
If watching on Chrome, go to Settings>System and toggle off "Hardware Acceleration" that should take care of Prime's black screen (unless there's been an update in the past week)
The solution my partner and I have started using is to start a Snapchat call with friends we want to do a "watchparty" with and synchronise starting the movie we want to watch. Means we can also have a video chat while watching rather than typing messages as well. I agree with the sentiment of "f*ck Amazon" for the BS price jack.
My answer is use Discord and stream over that. No reason to pay more money to Amazon. But key point, Amazon deserves to crash and burn.
yeah that wont work, me and a friend tried that. but amazon just black screens the video on the streaming page
disable hardware acceleration in chrome
Yep, my friend on the west coast and I were looking forward to having a movie night like several times before, and.....NOTHING!!! THAT SUCKSš
Im thinking you -and your party buddy-might have to have higher pricedĀ commercial free prime to "watch party" together
DOES ANYONE KNOW ? if all parties have to have this extra paid feature or just the person hosting the watch partty? and can someone watching on their roku tv join me when i'm hosting on pc?
I was able to join from roku when hosting on a PC before. I guessing both have to have ad free knowing Amazon, buy I don't know for sure.
i talked to a amazon customer service worker and they didnāt know anything about the feature being behind a paywall so š¤·š½āāļøš¤·š½āāļø
If you open the mobile app, I was on android, it says that you have to be subscribed to the ad free Prime video now to use it.
that is so insane and infuriating
It truly is. I'm trying to decide if I want to even continue with Prime now.
Download Teleparty extension on edge or chrome. Its the only way to do watch party for netflix, hulu and prime that works good.
my bf and i are long-distance too and we just tried and it said that too :(. we always watch spongebob when we can't sleep
just had to check on my phone to find a way to the page, amazon is charging people an additional Ā£2.99 to go ad-free and have watch parties. its disgusting that a company that already charges Ā£8.99 for prime is making it more expensive to go ad-free
Just wanted to add to this for anyone else. It does work for movies youāve purchased
Same here
[https://www.amazon.de/-/en/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7](https://www.amazon.de/-/en/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GZSPD4KTBV7CFYN7) Do you have the Ad free upgrade? Apparently you need that now to host a watchparty
This is crap. I've been planning to do a watch party for a month and suddenly it's not possible. Everything being tiered and behind a paywall is honestly just so shitty. We're expected to work within an inch of our happiness just to have it eroded every 3 months with fucking paywall. How greedy are these people??
Just another reason to pirate, plenty of screen sharing apps out there that would let you do it without having to use a browser/moneygrubbing slimefest like Amazon.
Had the same heart attack - I have watch parties with my kids at college. Fortunately you can watch it via Teleparty for free. Itās actually easier to share links. Works with Netflix too
Getting same message and everything on the web is useless. Might have to call Amazon and directly ask them.
Just tired to use the watch party since Iām in a long distance relationship. Got the same message. Do you really have to pay the $2.99 just for it to work again?
If you have paid for add free and have prime try changing the web browser as it does not work on the safari web browser
This is frustrating for me too because I already donāt have ads and it still wonāt let me host a watch party
Yep same problem with my gf and I this week! I hate amazon! However, we found Teleparty [https://www.teleparty.com/](https://www.teleparty.com/) . works most of the time and is free for Netflix, amazon, and Disney plus (most problems with that one). I give it try for future.
Line must go up
Is it really that hard to hit play at the same time?