On Monday, Amazon announced the dates for its fourth-annual Summer Beauty Event, which offers discounts across the beauty category from April 27 to May 10. For shoppers, the event is a chance to snag as much as half off everything from makeup to beauty tools. For Amazon, it’s an opportunity to win over beauty shoppers — but those same shoppers have countless other retailers where they can spend their beauty budgets.
Amazon’s event kicks off just a week after Sephora concluded its spring savings event, and roughly a month after Ulta’s 21 Days of Beauty in March. But while Amazon’s beauty sale, which includes flash deals of up to 50% on specific categories throughout the two-week event, offers a steeper discount than Sephora’s notoriously strict savings tiers, the e-commerce giant does not want its beauty category to be known only for sales.
“It’s so important to us that we position our brands in a premium way, that’s authentic to how they tell their brand story,” said Camille Nordby, premium beauty category leader at Amazon U.S. Stores. “Discounting can be a really great moment in a year for a brand, whether it’s gifting-focused or whatever, but it shouldn’t be the primary way they’re telling the story.”
Amazon Prime Day, which typically kicks off in the summer and offers discounts across the site as a whole, will give consumers another chance to buy beauty products on sale. But Nordby said Amazon is keeping a conservative approach to discounting.
“Amazon as a whole is not getting any more promotional. Beauty, specifically, we are not adding any promotional days this year,” she added. Amazon declined to share whether the retailer or brands cover the cost of discounting during promotional events. “We believe we still have quite a few less promotional days than many other premium beauty retailers, and this is where we’re staying. We’re very comfortable here. And something like this event is designed to specifically highlight relevant products and relevant brands at this moment, in contrast to what might be going on at Prime Day, where you’re looking across the whole site.”
Beauty has been growing as Amazon has grown its brand assortment. According to e-commerce agency Front Row, U.S. beauty sales on the platform grew 13% in Q1 2026. The category is especially popular with younger consumers; according to Amazon, beauty is the top category for driving cash back for Prime for Young Adult members, which offers shoppers ages 18-24 discounted access to the Prime membership. Nordby said young men are also shopping for beauty on Amazon and often compare more products in their beauty shopping.
Amazon will offer a window with specific discounts for male grooming products during its summer sale. But Nordby said Amazon wants beauty consumers to be turning to the platform for discovery as much as discounting.
“Where we do want to keep supporting customers and doing more is around discoverability. Customers absolutely come to Amazon, and they buy $400 fragrances and what have you. But how can we make sure that when you want to discover that new fragrance, or perhaps you want to discover a new serum that may be at a higher price point, how can we make sure that they have the look and the feel, and they can get comfortable with that product without being in person?”
Digital tools like virtual try-on technologies for foundation shade matching can help bridge the gap. But perhaps few digital tools can push the consumer into making a purchase like artificial intelligence. According to Amazon, 300 million customers used its AI shopping assistant Rufus in 2025. During November and December, Amazon shoppers who utilized Rufus to make a purchase spent 80% more than those who did not. Sephora too is experimenting with AI; in March, the LVMH-owned retailer announced an integration with its app and ChatGPT.
Amazon is also expanding its brand assortment in an effort to capture new consumers. In April, Amazon launched Rabanne fragrances, the first fragrance brand from the Puig portfolio to join the retailer. Puig-owned makeup brand Charlotte Tilbury joined Amazon’s U.S. beauty store in September.
In October, Amazon launched a dedicated K-beauty storefront to meet the second wave of demand for Korean beauty products among U.S. shoppers. According to e-commerce agency Front Row, search volume for K-beauty ingredient black rice exfoliant is up 340,736 year to date alongside interest in high-performance, science-backed formulations.
While specialty beauty retailers like Sephora and Ulta are known for helping to launch brands or act as the exclusive retailer for emerging brands, Amazon has become an additional destination for beauty brands that already have an extensive distribution network. In February, Bath & Body Works, which has 1,900 stores across North America, joined Amazon.
“We’re not looking for brand exclusivity. We want your brand wherever your customer is,” said Nordby. “That being said, of course, when we do get exclusive product launches, it really enables us to go big on the partnership and on the launch. And so one example of where we’ve had tremendous success with a brand is Laneige. We had the Lip Sleeping Lip Mask partnership, which was an exclusive, and we’ve done a number of other exclusive partnerships with them. It’s really tuning into the Amazon customer and what resonates for them.”
But when consumers can also buy Rabanne fragrances or K-beauty brands like Cosrx or Laneige elsewhere, retailers like Amazon are leveraging other factors like convenience to capture a sale. Nordby said Amazon’s beauty sale will feature perks like delivery in as little as 30 minutes. Walmart, which has also beefed up its beauty assortment in recent months, touted a record-breaking delivery time of five minutes in February.
If there’s one thing beauty shoppers have come to expect, whether at a department store or a specialty retail, it’s freebies and sampling. Nordby said Amazon will test out loyalty perks, like gifts with purchase, for beauty consumers in the months to come.
“We’re very focused on creating a better loyalty experience for our beauty customers and doing more. It’s a big focus and investment area for us this year. We’ve already done a lot more this year with ‘Buy X, Get Y,’ and some of those kinds of promotional types,” said Nordby. “But we want to make it even more fun. And things like sampling and gift with purchase, which are so important in beauty, that’s an area where we get to kind of lead the way for Amazon stores, which is really fun.”
