A lot of us in Malaysia may not be familiar with the Amazon brand, as this online retail giant tend to focus its operations in the US only. But the latest version 5.0 update to its Android app may finally make Amazon as a whole, more compelling for us here.
The update to Amazon’s store app came early to mid September at Google Play Store. The changelog is short, but it brings a few surprises:
What’s New
- Prime members in the US can enjoy unlimited Prime Instant Video from within the Amazon app by downloading the Prime Instant Video player, delivered exclusively via the Amazon Appstore
- The new Amazon App for Android phones now enables US customers to discover and purchase all of Amazon’s digital catalog, in addition to an award-winning mobile shopping experience on hundreds of millions of physical goods
- 5GB of free photo back-up with Amazon Cloud Drive
The photo backup to Cloud Drive is nice and all, but there are three things that make this update a great one:
- Amazon Prime Instant Video seems to work here in Malaysia during our Fire TV review, when we used a DNS server bypass and signed in with our Malaysian Amazon account. In the past, you can only stream Prime Instant Video on the browser, or Amazon’s devices. However as of this update, all Android smartphones that have this Amazon app installed, can access Instant Video.
- Amazon Appstore is made for its Kindle and Fire devices, but it is also made available for any Android smartphone, downloadable here: http://www.amazon.com/getappstore. The 5.0 update effectively made the standalone app store obsolete, as Android apps can be searched and downloaded from the main Amazon app now.
- Though it wasn’t being officially announced, we can now purchase Kindle eBooks too. Previously, with a Malaysian Amazon account, we cannot purchase Appstore apps, Kindle eBooks, et cetera. We can now, and while competing bookstores tend to sell the books cheaper (like Google Play Books and Kobo), Amazon has a wider selection of books not found elsewhere.
There are still many devices not compatible with this update, namely the newer Nexus tablets, and the LG G Pad. Video playback of Instant Video also doesn’t have Chromecast support as of now. It is still unclear on how Google feels about all this, since it doesn’t allow the distribution of any app store within its own app store. Since the Amazon app now serves APKs, it may violate the terms. Amazon for iOS also doesn’t seem to have the Prime Instant Video feature yet.
Give the features mentioned above a whirl, with the new Amazon app downloadable here: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.amazon.mShop.android.
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