Introduction
Prime Day 2025 didn’t just break records. It rewrote the rules. For brands advertising on Amazon, this event continues to be one of the most powerful sales moments of the year, with Adobe Analytics reporting that consumers spent $24.1 billion online in the US.
While Prime Day itself has been a summer staple event since 2015, this year marked a turning point, and not just because it spanned four days. Across the board, brands leaned into performance, and the results delivered. But the real breakout story was AI which proved its value beyond efficiency and became a driver of real revenue growth.
This report pulls insights from Xnurta customers to uncover how brands performed across Sponsored Ads and DSP, highlights key trends in AI adoption, and outlines what winning brands did differently — so you can apply those lessons to Q4 and beyond.
Overall Performance
Prime Day ad performance saw explosive year-over-year growth across the Xnurta platform, with ad sales and GMV growing faster than ad spend:
- Ad Spend rose by +237%
- Total Ad Sales increased +250%
- GMV grew +278%
This year, traffic patterns were unpredictable. For the first time, we saw a “saddle-shaped” spending curve — a huge spike on day one, a mid-event dip, then a second surge. Xnurta’s AI adapted in real-time:
- Captured early surges with aggressive pacing
- Pulled back when traffic cooled
- Re-engaged at the right time to seize the second wave
The result? Smarter budget allocation and sustained return across all four days.
Category Performance and Insights
Category growth wasn’t just reserved for the obvious winners. Brands across every vertical found opportunity — especially those that came prepared with targeted campaigns, full-funnel coverage, and AI-optimized offers. These brands were able to seize moment-by-moment shifts in demand and convert attention into revenue, faster.
- Home-focused categories surged: Kitchen, Appliances, Patio, and Home goods all saw increases above +300%, reinforcing that home continues to be a high-converting focus for Prime Day shoppers.
- Beauty stood out in a crowded space: With a +378% spike, Beauty & Personal Care was one of the most competitive and responsive verticals, likely driven by gift bundles, limited-time discounts, and strong mobile creatives.
- Electronics & Computing rebounded: After slower growth in early 2025, Prime Day reignited interest in Computers, Accessories, and Consumer Electronics — all seeing gains over +330%.
- Widespread gains across verticals: Even traditionally slower-moving categories like Office Products, Baby, and Arts & Crafts posted gains of +200% or more, showing how Prime Day lifts traffic and sales across the entire catalog.
Growth varied sharply by category. Xnurta AI dynamically adapted bidding strategies based on each category’s behavior:
1. Essentials with Early Peaks (e.g., Kitchen & Bath):
33% of Prime Day sales happened on day one. AI pre-heated keywords 72 hours prior to the start of Prime Day to maximize the burst, then shifted pacing as price-sensitive shopping behavior emerged.
2. Gradual Climbers (e.g., Large Appliances):
Sales ramped steadily, with day four making up 30% of total revenue. AI scaled budgets dynamically in the back half to meet demand, leading to +66.7% YoY growth.
3. Niche Breakouts (e.g., Small Appliances):
These products surged +140% YoY. Xnurta AI identified intent signals early and accelerated investments around them, turning momentum into volume.
Takeaway:
Top-performing categories were prepared, well-represented, and responsive to the Prime Day moment. Brands in every vertical can learn from these leaders: ramp early, align offers to category demand, and let AI adjust to consumer behavior in real-time to stay competitive.
The Rise of AI: Growth, Speed, and Scale
AI wasn’t just a cost-saver this year — it became a growth engine. Here’s how it stacked up:
- +276% GMV growth for AI-managed accounts, outperforming GMV for manual strategies (+250%)
- +251% YoY increase in campaigns using AI profiles
- +205% YoY increase in AI adoption on Xnurta’s platform
- 4x more optimizations per hour per profile using AI
- +717% more AI-driven optimizations vs. manual optimizations
The key advantage? Speed. AI profiles reacted in real time to Prime Day surges, optimizing every few minutes to capture peak traffic windows and scale spend precisely when it mattered.
Sponsored Ads: What Winning Brands Did
Winning Sponsored Ad strategies shared a few things in common:
- Early Setup and Learning: High-performers locked in campaigns weeks ahead of Prime Day, letting AI systems learn and optimize before traffic spiked.
- Dynamic Budget Scaling: AI profiles scaled daily budgets based on real-time ROAS trends, automatically reallocating spend toward top-performing ASINs.
- ASIN Optimization: Aggressive ASIN pruning and activation (as shown in campaign logs) helped top brands double down on what was working, and cut what wasn’t — fast.
- Granular Targeting: Successful profiles didn’t just push best-sellers. They segmented by keyword themes, audience signals, and stage-of-funnel, letting AI tailor budget and bids for each.
DSP: Building Awareness That Converts
Brands that used DSP to complement Sponsored Ads saw outsized impact. Top DSP tactics included:
- Audience Re-engagement: Retargeting cart-abandoners and product viewers drove stronger second-touch conversions
- Pre-Prime Day Awareness: DSP campaigns starting in late June created familiarity and interest, driving increased brand searches and detail page views during Prime Day
- Customer Lifetime Value Gains: While new-to-brand (NTB) is important, Prime Day delivered gains on customer lifetime value for brands who used AMC audiences to cross-target customers who previously bought their products
DSP was especially effective when paired with Sponsored Ads to drive both reach and precision.
AMC Audiences: Who Drove the Strongest Performance?
Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) data reveals which audience segments delivered the highest return during Prime Day. Here’s what stood out:
Top-Performing Audiences:
- Conversion Users: Shoppers who previously purchased showed the strongest performance across all ACOS bands. They responded especially well to tailored Sponsored Ads and retargeting via DSP.
- Click Users: Shoppers who previously clicked on products but didn’t convert were highly responsive to retargeting, especially when paired with time-sensitive offers or Prime Day-exclusive bundles.
- Add-to-Cart audiences: Brands saw success running DSP to stay top-of-mind and move customers from consideration to conversion
- Lookalike audiences: Brands saw strong performance from AMC lookalike audiences of multi-brand purchasers.
With Amazon’s five-year purchase data for AMC audiences, brands can target more past-purchasers than ever before. This will especially help product categories with longer purchase cycles such as consumer electronics.
Performance Insights:
- SA campaigns saw better ACOS across “Conversion Users” and “Click Users” than broad retargeting or demographic audiences.
- Past purchasers and intent-behavior segments delivered a balance of scale and efficiency, performing well in both low- and mid-ACOS ranges.
- Lower-performing segments included general “wishlist” audiences and cold interest groups, showing that behavioral depth outperforms generic reach.
Takeaway:
Prime Day success was not just about reaching more shoppers, it was about reaching the right ones. Brands that layered AMC audience targeting into their Sponsored and DSP strategies saw stronger returns, especially when retargeting high-intent groups.
What This Means for Future Events
It’s too early to say whether Amazon will continue extending the length of their major events, but consumer behavior will continue to evolve as both shoppers and sellers adopt AI. To prepare for Q4, four truths have emerged:
- AI isn’t optional anymore. The brands who embraced AI won more revenue, made more optimizations, and moved faster than the competition.
- Performance = Preparation. Top campaigns didn’t “flip the switch” on Prime Day – they built momentum in the weeks leading up.
- Efficiency must scale. Despite massive spend increases, strong ACOS and ROI came from smarter budget allocation, not more budget alone.
- Always test, always learn. Prime Day’s real-time volatility rewards agile decision-making. AI keeps up in a way that manual campaigns can’t replicate.
