Beauty takes centre stage on Amazon Prime Day

Kaycee Enerva

10th Jul 2026

Amazon Prime Day saw a surge in beauty and cosmetics sales, with one in four shoppers making purchases in this category.

Market Defense’s ‘The Beauty Power Players: Amazon Prime Day June 2026 Report’ reveals the changing dynamics of the online shopping event.

“Prime Day 2026 had a clear message for the beauty industry: shoppers arrive knowing exactly what they want – and increasingly, what they want is prestige,” said Vanessa Kuykendall, chief engagement officer at Market Defense.

This year, prestige brands were found to perform ‘exceptionally well’, with Armani Beauty claiming the top fragrance spot and Tarte overtaking Maybelline in the makeup segment. K-beauty brands also made a strong impression, with Medicube capturing nearly 16 per cent of the skincare market.

Four days surrounding Prime Day set new e-commerce records, generating $26.4 billion in sales – surpassing the combined totals of Black Friday and Cyber Monday last year.

The event experienced a 9.3 per cent year-over-year growth, a marked slowdown from last year’s 30.3 per cent. Beauty products accounted for 26 per cent of overall cart share, up from 25 per cent last year.

A 71 per cent increase in beauty search volume was recorded during Prime Day week, which rose from 102.4 million to 174.8 million searches.

Shoppers proved savvy, with 53 per cent comparing prices at Walmart and Target before making purchases on Amazon. Furthermore, 41 per cent of consumers placed three or more separate orders during the event.

Competing retailers such as Walmart and Target also ran simultaneous sales events, drawing a similar portion of Prime Day shoppers.

“Walmart pulled roughly half of Prime Day shoppers into cross-shopping,” according to the report, while Target engaged 32 per cent of the same audience.

Consumer search behaviour is also evolving, with one in five beauty purchases beginning with a brand name search instead of the usual generic product type.

“The single most searched beauty term on Prime Day was the brand name ‘Medicube,” remarked Dave Karlsven, SVP of partnerships and growth at Market Defence.

“For as long as I’ve done this work, generic terms owned the top of search, and brands fought for position underneath them. That flipped this year.”