In June, Amazon started offering solicitations for a chance to buy the hard-to-get PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X consoles — so anyone could try their luck without the stress of a live restock and all the F5 spam. Now, almost two months later, Amazon has confirmed via his Amazon Games Twitter account that the invites are finally going out for both consoles. These invitations will be sent out in waves, with another round expected to go out next week.
When you receive one of these invitations, you have 72 hours to make the purchase on the Amazon site using the unique link in the email. Speaking from personal experience with the Xbox invite I received today, Amazon’s emails look a bit generic – they’re just from “Amazon.com” and the subject line just reads “Congratulations, you’re invited!” Which at first glance looks a bit spammy. So make sure you don’t accidentally delete it on a whim like I almost did.
These invites are a welcome departure from Amazon’s track record of shoddy restocks, where the consoles usually sell out quickly amid numerous checkout errors. You’d think the ecommerce giant could come up with a queuing system for live replenishment of in-demand items, but at least this is a useful alternative.
If you have not yet requested an invite, the pages for the default $499.99 Playstation 5the $549.99 PS5 Bundle of Horizon Forbidden Westand the $499 Xbox Series X they all have buttons to request an invite on Amazon now. You don’t have to be a Prime subscriber and you can see if you’re lucky in one of Amazon’s upcoming invitation waves.