How to fix Amazon Prime Video when it's not working

Free deliveries and exclusive deals are great, but it’s worth getting an Amazon Prime subscription just for free access to Prime Video. The streaming service is home to some excellent Amazon original content and gives you the option to rent and buy the latest movies, subscribe to channels (depending on the region), and even watch live streams of concerts and sports. But like any app on our phones, computers, and smart TVs, there are occasions when Prime Video might stop working. Here’s a look at some common Amazon Prime Video problems and how to fix them.

Prime Video doesn’t work? Try these fixes

Problem #1: Streaming  problems on Prime Video

You might have problems with buffering, slow load times, or a video not working on Prime Video with the error code 1060. This error code or messages like “Something went wrong” are usually associated with bandwidth and network connectivity issues. While 1060 is the most common, you might also see other error code numbers like 1007, 1022, 7031, 7135, 7202, 7203, 7204, 7206, 7207, 7230, 7250, 7251, 7301, 7303, 7305, 7306, 8020, 9003, and 9074 for streaming issues.

Potential solutions:

• These error codes are likely because of internet connectivity or bandwidth problems. Amazon recommends at least 1Mbps speeds for SD content, 5Mbps for HD content, and 25Mbps speeds for 4K UHD titles. Run a network speed test on your phone or computer to see if you are getting the speed you’re supposed to. If you’re facing connectivity problems, check out our guide on how to fix Wi-Fi issues.
• If you’re using a media streaming device to watch Prime Video on a TV, make sure that the HDMI cable meets the HDCP 1.4 (for HD content) and HDCP 2.2 (for UHD and HDR content) standards. Ensure that the cable isn’t torn or frayed and is in working condition. You might need a new HDMI cable to fix your streaming problems.
• Restart the device and re-open the Prime Video app. If you’re streaming on a portable device, it may also be worth trying a different internet connection like 5G instead of Wi-Fi.

Problem #2: More streaming problems

Your Prime Video streaming problems may not have to do with hardware or network connectivity. Instead, it might be because of the settings and too many simultaneous streams.

Potential solutions:

• Prime Video automatically detects the best possible video quality for the stream, but you can change and force it to select the best option if you’re seeing poor video quality. While watching a video on your phone, browser, or smart TV, go to the gear icon at the top right corner and choose Best to look the stream to the highest video quality setting. It will also tell you the amount of data every level will use, so make sure you have enough data if you’re using a mobile service. Remember that if you do have bandwidth issues, you will see excessive buffering and slower load times at the highest quality setting.
• Poor video quality on your smart TV might be because of the motion smoothing setting. Motion smoothing is a good setting to activate when watching sports (which you now can on Prime Video), but it makes many movies and TV shows look bad. It’s best to turn off the option on your TV if possible. Depending on the TV manufacturer, it’s called different things, like Action Smoothing, Auto Motion, Tru Motion, Motion Flow, and more. You’ll have to look around in your TV’s Picture settings to find it.
• You can sign in to Prime Video on multiple devices, but Amazon limits the number of concurrent streams to just three. If three devices are already watching shows and movies on Prime Video, it won’t work on a fourth. Interestingly, Prime Video allows two simultaneous streams of the same title, though.
• Check how many devices are signed into your Prime Video account and remove any that are unused. Open the Prime Video website, click on your profile icon at the top right corner, go to Accounts and settings > Your devices (tab), and select Deregister next to the devices you want to remove.
• RAM management on your device might also stop Prime Video from working properly. This may not be a common problem, but one I’ve faced. Videos wouldn’t load, and the video quality was horrible when it finally did because I had too many Chrome tabs open. Close extra tabs and shut down apps running in the background on your phone to fix this issue.

Problem #3: Payments not working on Prime Video

You can rent or buy titles and subscribe to channels on Prime Video. But if you see the error code 2063, your payment option isn’t working. You might also see other payment-related error codes like 2016, 2021, 2023, 2026, 2027, 2028, 2029, 2040, 2041, 2043, 2044, 2047, 2048, or 7035.

Potential solutions:

• Click on your profile icon, go to Accounts and settings > Your account (tab) and scroll down to Payment settings. Ensure that 1-click payment is enabled to allow you to rent or purchase TV shows and movies. This can be a different card than what you use for you your Prime subscription. Click Change to choose a different card.
• Your Prime Video channel subscriptions are linked to your Prime account payment card. Ensure that the card you’ve selected allows online transactions and verify the payment details. You’ll find the option in the Your account tab under the Prime subscription section.
• Of course, payments will fail if you don’t have enough balance on a debit card or available limit on a credit card. Change the card to an alternate option to make sure your payments go through.

Problem #4: Sign-in, sign-out, and account problems

You’ll see the error code 5004 if you have trouble signing in to your Prime Video account. Error codes 5014 or 5016 will pop up when your Prime Video profile PIN doesn’t work.

Potential solutions:

• Make sure that you are using the correct email address and password to sign in to your account. If you have enabled two-factor authentication, you will need access to the device with the Authenticator app.
• Try to sign in again after a few minutes since the problem might be because of internal server issues. Check sites like Is the service down or Down detector to see if Amazon is having issues.
• If you’re still not able to sign in, you might want to change your password. Click on Forgot your password on the sign-in page and go through the password reset steps in the confirmation email.
• To sign out of Prime Video, click on your profile icon and select Sign-out. If you aren’t able to sign out for some reason, you can deregister the device instead. Click the profile icon, go to Settings and accounts > Your devices and click Deregister next to the ones you want to remove.
• You can set up a Prime Video PIN to authorize purchases and enable parental controls. If your PIN doesn’t work, go to Settings and accounts > Parental controls and reset your PIN. Remember that the PIN only works for a single device. You will have to set a new PIN on every device with Prime Video to get parental controls across the board.

Problem #5: Amazon Prime Video not working on Google Chrome

You’ll see error code 7235 if you can’t use Prime Video on the Google Chrome browser or on Chromebooks.

Potential solutions:

• Make sure that you are running the latest version of Chrome. Click on the three vertical dots icon at the top right corner and go to Help > About Google Chrome. You will see an Update Chrome button if you have an older version.
• In the browser address bar, type chrome://components, scroll down to Widevine content decryption module, and click Check for update. This feature is used to play DRM-protected content, so make it is enabled and updated.
• If updating the browser doesn’t work, click on the three vertical dots icon and go to Settings > Privacy and security > Site settings. Scroll down to Additional content settings and click Protected content IDs. Ensure that Site can play protected content and Site can use identifiers to play protected content are both enabled. If you want to block other sites, you can add Prime Video to the custom Allow list at the bottom.

Problem #6: The Prime Video app is freezing or crashing

Prime Video might freeze or crash frequently like any smartphone or smart TV app.

Potential solutions:

• Update the app to the latest version. This is a more common problem on a smart TV since you have forgotten to enable auto-update. Open Google Play Store, go to Settings > Auto-update apps, and enable Auto-update at any time.
• Clear the app cache and storage to fix issues with the app crashing. Check out our guides on how to clear the cache on Android, on an Amazon Fire TV or Fire TV stick, and on a browser. Clearing app storage will erase your saved login info, so you will have to sign in to your account again.
• Try deleting and reinstalling the Prime Video app if nothing else works. Otherwise, the only option is to wait for a software update to fix the problem.