It often feels like you can buy almost anything from Amazon. The company’s website and mobile apps offer millions of products, ranging from books and music to home goods, clothing, and electronics. You can even buy cars through Amazon Auto, although you’ll want to know these five tips beforehand. Amazon gift cards are arguably one of the most versatile and convenient virtual gifting options for birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries. 

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Despite their broad reach, however, Amazon gift cards aren’t the be-all and end-all of shopping. There are still several items and services you can’t purchase using this convenient payment option. In this article, we’ll explore the things you can’t buy with an Amazon gift card, shedding light on the limitations of this seemingly all-encompassing payment method. Whether you’re redeeming a gift card for yourself or gifting one to a loved one, it’s important to know what your card can — and can’t — get you. So, let’s dive in!

While Amazon gift cards offer a lot of flexibility within Amazon’s marketplace, you can’t use them to buy other gift cards. This includes cards from well-known retailers like Starbucks, Apple, or Amazon itself. While there are a few Amazon tools to make gift-giving easier, this restriction prevents you from using your Amazon gift card to purchase items from outside of the Amazon ecosystem.

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Another key limitation is that you can’t use Amazon gift cards to purchase prepaid cards, such as those from Visa or MasterCard. If you want to purchase or load funds onto a prepaid card, you’ll need to use a more traditional payment method like a credit or debit card.

While Amazon Pay is a convenient way to make payments on third-party websites, it doesn’t allow you to use your Amazon gift card balance. Instead, Amazon Pay will only draw from linked payment methods like credit or debit cards or an existing Amazon account balance. This means that if you’re looking to use your Amazon gift card for online purchases on external sites, you’ll need to reconsider and choose a different payment method.

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Although Amazon is a good platform for buying collectible coins, you can’t use your gift card for this. Since collectible coins are considered high-value items, they can sometimes be subject to fraud or counterfeiting, or resold for illicit purposes like money laundering. As a result, Amazon excludes collectible coins from the list of products that can be purchased with a gift card.

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Similarly, Amazon prohibits the use of gift cards for items intended for commercial resale, meaning you can’t use them to stock up on inventory for your business or flip items for profit. This ensures that Amazon gift cards are used as intended — for personal purchases. 

Finally, it’s important to note that these gift cards are tied to the country-specific Amazon marketplace where they are purchased. In other words, you cannot use your Amazon gift card on a different country’s Amazon site. For example, a gift card purchased on Amazon.com (the U.S. site) won’t work on Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.in. If you want to give an Amazon gift card to someone in another country, you must buy the card from that country’s dedicated Amazon site.

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