It happens a lot. You try to watch your favorite shows and streams on Amazon Prime Video, but something stops you. Whether you see an error message or not, the fact is the content you’ve chosen is not playing. Is Amazon Prime blocking your VPN or Proxy?
The answer is “probably” if you’re using one to enhance your streaming experience. But what if you’re not using any of those tools? There may be other reasons, indeed.
Whatever this is, you need to understand the situation, diagnose the problem and find a proper way to fix it. In this article, you’ll see the most common Prime Video errors regarding VPNs and Proxy servers, their potential causes, and possible solutions, of course.
Does Amazon Prime block VPN and Proxy servers?
Unfortunately, the short answer is “Yes,” Amazon Prime blocks VPNs and Proxies. And the company is really skillful at it. It’s been an ongoing struggle between Amazon and the VPN providers for many years.
Why does Amazon Prime block VPNs?
The problem is Amazon doesn’t want people to use those tools with Prime Video because of its licensing agreements with third-party studios and producers.
Although Amazon Prime Video is one of the most popular streaming video services globally, it’s unavailable in all countries. People who live in countries where the service hasn’t arrived yet or is prohibited often use VPNs and HTTP proxies to bypass Amazon Prime geographical restrictions.
VPN services allow users to spoof their location, thus opening up all the geo-blocked content for them. Content that Amazon is only allowed to stream on territories where it has valid distribution licenses. For that reason, films, TV shows, live events, and series streaming in the US might be unavailable in the UK, for example.
To further discourage VPN usage, Prime Video kind of started allowing access from abroad to your local content . That is one major issue users have about VPN blocking on streaming platforms. In Amazon’s service, users can now download the content beforehand and watch it offline anywhere.
But if you don’t make this “travel arrangement,” you will be limited to the content available for the region you are physically in, though.
What are the possible causes for the VPN error in Amazon Prime?
Prime Video can trigger error alerts for different reasons. There are two possible scenarios for “VPN or Proxy” errors: Amazon Prime Video has detected and blocked VPN (or Proxy) traffic, or it can be a false positive.
When your videos are not playing due to VPN or Proxy issues, you’ll likely be getting error messages on your screen mentioning those tools or the situations in which they are typically used.
According to Prime Video itself (2), other types of errors can also be “fixed” when you “disable any VPN or Proxy servers.” In practice, that means their system can display VPN or Proxy related errors in many situations, even when neither of those tools is enabled.
These errors may be related to your device or Internet connection. It may have to do, for example, with the IP address assigned to your device by your ISP. Perhaps the streaming platform has already added this address to its IP blocking list.
You can try these solutions in the given order to fix the problem:
- Make sure your internet connection is working correctly. Just try to do something else online to see if it works;
- If your connection is ok, check if your device’s OS has a new version available and update it if that’s the case. That won’t be the problem in most cases unless you have disabled automatic updates;
- Do the same to your browser if you’re trying to access Prime Video through its website instead of the dedicated streaming app;
- On the other hand, if you’re using the application, ensure you have the latest version installed;
- Try to restart your device if you haven’t yet due to a software update in the previous steps;
- Restart your router. Pull it off the outlet and keep it unplugged for a few minutes. That will increase your chances of having a new IP assigned to it. Perhaps one that isn’t blocked yet.