Ethical alternatives to Amazon

Many of us have come to rely on online shopping for its ease and convenience. But with Amazon dominating the market, it can be tricky to find more ethical online retailers.

Luckily, there are a growing number of alternatives to Amazon, whether you’re looking for books, clothing or gifts. In this article, we give our recommendations for online options with proper sustainability credentials.

These ethical Amazon alternatives respect their workers, address their environmental footprint and some even support smaller independent retailers.

What are the best online alternatives to Amazon?

Amazon alternatives for books

Amazon started out as an online bookseller and has dominated the market ever since it launched. The number of independent bookshops in the UK and Ireland has almost halved since 1995, the year after Amazon was founded. And Amazon dominates bookselling in the UK with more than 50% of all print sales. 

But despite that, local independent bookshops are returning to the high street – with the number now at its highest in the UK since 2013. The Booksellers Association has a useful search page for finding independent bookshops.

If you're lucky enough to have an independent bookshop near you, we recommend them. 

You can also support independent books through Hive and Bookshop.org. Both of these online sellers give you the option of a small payment going to independent bookshops.

Most high street bookshops don't score so well in our bookshop guide - particularly after Waterstones bought up several brands. Waterstones is owned by US firm Elliott Investment Management, whose ethics leave something to be desired.

Oxfam Bookshops is a good choice for secondhand bookshops on the high street.

There are several good online options for new and secondhand books, including Better World Books, Biblio, and World of Books. 

We also recommend ebooks.com and xigxag for ebooks and audio. 

Find more ethical Amazon alternatives for books in our shopping guide to bookshops.

Amazon alternatives for online shopping

Whether you’re looking for clothes, body care, stationary or gifts, there are lots of online retailers that offer more ethical alternatives to Amazon.

eBay is Amazon’s largest competitor, but also doesn’t have a great track record on many ethical issues. 

Why not try Ethical Shop or Shared Earth instead? Both are perfect for gifts and stock items like cosmetics, jewellery and food.

Looking for something else? Ethical Consumer has rated and ranked 18 ethical online retailers. We check out what they sell - from cleaning products and alcohol to children’s toys.

Buying online without Amazon

Amazon alternatives for tablets & e-readers

Finding alternatives to Amazon in the markets it dominates, such as e-readers, can be tough. But other brands are out there. 

We recommend that you buy a secondhand or refurbished tablet whenever possible.

However, for new tablets there are­ a couple of companies that score comparatively well. These are Acer, ASUS, HMD, and Nokia. 

Find alternatives to Amazon’s tablets and e-readers.

Amazon alternatives for clothes

Amazon sells a range of clothing on its website. However, it performs poorly regarding key ethical issues in the sector, such as policies to protect workers in supply chains and its commitment to reducing its carbon footprint.

The clothing sector is luckily full of sustainable Amazon alternatives, offering Fairtrade, organic or other ethical fashion.

If you’re shopping on the high street, Patagonia is one of the best options. It only uses organic cotton and is working to address issues like plastic pollution. It also has an online shop.

Even better, there is a range of specialist ethical brands, such as THTC and Brothers We Stand. They have fair pay and environmental practices at the heart of their business model.

Your best option though, will always be buying secondhand: our feature article includes tips about upcycling, repair and buying secondhand, plus we also have an article about charity shops and clothing.

See our guide to ethical clothes shops featuring lots of independent and innovative companies.

Amazon alternatives for buying food

Although Amazon is now closing its Amazon Fresh high street shops, it plans to move more into online grocery selling with the Whole Foods Market brand. 

Find alternative grocery, food and supermarket options with our guide to supermarkets which rates 12 brands, plus, a separate guide to alternative ethical food online stores.

Keen to avoid big multinational supermarkets? 

We have a guide to eco food store alternatives featuring many ethical online food retailers. 

Alternatives for gift vouchers

Amazon gift vouchers are popular for friends and family, work occasions, and also as incentives for survey participation. The good news is that many of our best buy and recommended brands in the bookshops and online retailers guides have gift vouchers, and we've created an easy table for you to use to find alternatives to Amazon. 

Why avoid Amazon?

Amazon has been accused of everything from firing employees for calling out its unsafe conditions to offering services to fossil fuel giants. You can find out more about reasons to avoid the company in our '10 reasons to avoid Amazon' article.

The billion-dollar company scores very poorly across all our ratings based on its ethical and environmental record and comes at the near bottom of most tables where they feature. (See below for a full list of guides that feature Amazon).

Our boycott focuses on Amazon’s staggering tax avoidance. Our research has calculated that in 2023, Amazon’s tax avoidance may have cost around £433million to the UK’s public purse. 

In addition, Amazon is also being boycotted by groups around the world for its involvement with the genocide in Gaza, through its Amazon Web Services business.

Amazon’s monopolistic behaviour threatens small businesses trying to do better. Our guides below include more ethical options, so you can ensure you’re not supporting this arch tax avoider while channelling your money to more ethical companies. 

What can you do?

You can sign up to your pledge to try to avoid Amazon - we will send you regular emails with tips from others who are reducing their use of Amazon.

Also try some of the alternative companies in our shopping guides.

Plus, contact Amazon and tell them why you are cancelling your Prime subscription or shopping elsewhere, and estimate how much money you haven't spent with them.

Look up some of other guides which feature alternatives to Amazon