Amazon's insurance rule stopped waiting for your sales in some categories. Five questions show where you stand

The change in one paragraph

Amazon has required sellers to carry commercial liability insurance for years, but only once they were big enough: within 30 days of passing $10,000 in gross proceeds from Amazon.com sales in a month, with at least $1 million of coverage per occurrence and in the aggregate. That rule stays. From November 2, 2026, Amazon adds two more. Sellers with products in categories that carry enhanced safety listing requirements need the same $1 million policy regardless of sales, for new and existing listings. And sellers based in Mainland China must get their insurance through Amazon's own program, the Amazon Insurance Accelerator.

For a large brand already past $10,000 a month, the first change sounds like nothing. For a new account, a second brand, or a small seller launching a supplement or a kids' product, it's the difference between listing and waiting. Five yes-or-no questions sort out where you stand.

Question 1: Do any of your products sit in an enhanced-safety category?

Amazon's announcement names children's products, cosmetic and ingestible products, and lithium battery products as examples, and points to a category page with the full list. One compliance explainer counted 11 categories on that page as of October 26, 2026, and Amazon says the list changes over time. Your Account Health page shows the requirements that apply to your own products.

No: nothing new for you. The $10,000 trigger still applies. Skip to Question 4 if you already carry a policy, because the certificate checks apply to everyone who submits one.

Yes: go to Question 2. Note "any." One lithium-powered gadget added to a home goods account puts that account in scope.

It's worth an hour to walk the catalog with this in mind, because category placement isn't always obvious. A bath set that includes a lotion is a cosmetic product. A plush toy with a light-up battery pack may touch two categories at once. A protein bar sold as a gift-basket add-on is ingestible. The people who know these edge cases are usually the ones who build listings, not the ones who buy insurance, so put them in the same conversation. If a product could plausibly fall into a category, assume it does and let your broker and the Account Health page tell you otherwise.

Question 2: Is your policy already on file and does it cover those products?

Yes, and it lists the product types you sell in those categories: go to Question 3.

No policy yet: from November 2, you need one before those listings are fine, whatever your sales. The explainer we read reports that Amazon reviews the certificate before the listing in these categories, not 30 days after your first big month. If you're launching a new product line, put the broker call on the launch plan, not after it.

A policy, but written for something else: a policy bought for candles may not cover a supplement line. Ask your broker in writing whether the new product types are covered. The policy you have isn't the question. The certificate Amazon reads is.

Question 3: Are you based in Mainland China?

No: go to Question 4.

Yes: from November 2, Amazon rejects newly submitted policies that weren't obtained through the Amazon Insurance Accelerator. If you submitted a compliant third-party policy before November 2, you can keep using it until it expires, and then you'll need to move to the program. Put that expiry date on your calendar with a month of lead time.

Questions 4 and 5: Does the certificate match the account, and is the deductible within the limit?

These two catch more sellers than the headline change, because they're about paperwork rather than coverage.

Question 4, the named insured. According to the explainer's reading of Amazon's requirements page, the insured name on the certificate has to match the legal entity in the Account Info of the account submitting it. A single-member LLC can use its trade name. A group that buys one policy in the parent company's name and extends it to subsidiaries can fail this check on every subsidiary's account. If you run more than one selling account, check each certificate against each account.

Question 5, the deductible. The same reading says the deductible can't exceed $10,000 and must be printed on the certificate. A policy with a higher deductible, or a certificate that leaves it off, is the kind of thing that bounces on review.

If either answer is "no" or "not sure," ask your broker for a corrected certificate before you upload. Treat both of these as checks to confirm with your broker against the requirements page in your own Seller Central account; we're relaying one explainer's summary, not Amazon's full text.

What to do this week

If you sell in one of these categories, find out what notice Amazon has sent your account. A moderator in the announcement thread wrote that affected sellers get an email asking for proof of insurance within 45 days of the notice. That window comes from a forum reply rather than a help page, so treat the date in your own email as the real one.

Lithium batteries have their own timing to watch. The explainer notes that Amazon announced the lithium battery category on September 30 and said Account Health notifications for it would continue through November 16. If you sell anything with a battery and haven't seen a notice yet, don't read silence as an exemption; check Account Health directly.

Then make a short list, one line per selling account: categories in scope, policy on file, named insured, deductible, expiry date. It takes twenty minutes and turns a vague worry into three phone calls. Keep the list where the person who renews the policy will see it, because expiry dates are when these rules bite a second time: a lapsed certificate in an enhanced-safety category is now a listing problem, not a someday problem. If you're launching a brand or an entity in an enhanced-safety category in the next quarter, add the certificate to the launch plan. Insurance now belongs on the same list as the brand registration and the listing copy.

If you run several marketplace accounts and want the compliance paperwork, listings and operations tied together so a rule change doesn't stall a launch, our marketplaces team can help. Talk to us about your accounts.

Related work: Spin Market.