History of Amazon: From garage startup to tech titan
Every revolution has its starting point.
For aviation, it was Kitty Hawk, a beach town in North Carolina, where the Wright Brothers made the first controlled, powered airplane flights on December 17, 1903.
Orville Wright flew for 12 seconds and more than 120 feet at nearby Kill Devil Hills, but Kitty Hawk is forever known as the place where humans first took to the sky.
Ninety years later, a man named Jeff Bezos saw another Kitty Hawk moment - this time on the internet rather than in the sky. During the mid-90s, the internet was transitioning from a niche academic and military tool to a mainstream technology.
Bezos had read that web usage was growing at 2,300% per year and decided to establish an online bookstore.
He and his then-wife, MacKenzie Scott, left their jobs at the Wall Street investment firm D. E. Shaw and founded Amazon (AMZN) in a rented garage on Northeast 28th Street on July 5, 1994, after writing their business plan on a cross-country drive from New York City to Seattle.
Here's how Amazon grew into the ubiquitous "everything company" it is now over the decades that followed.
Amazon's early years
"This is the Kitty Hawk stage of electronic commerce," Bezos said in a "lost" interview recorded at a Special Libraries Association conference in June 1997, later resurfacing online in 2019 via entrepreneur Brian Roemmele. "We're moving forward in so many different areas."
"We're going to find out that a millennium from now people are going to look back and say ‘Wow, the late 20th century was really a great time to be alive on this planet.'"
Bezos initially named the company Cadabra, but later changed it to Amazon, after the Amazon River in South America, in part because it begins with the letter "A," placing it early in alphabetical listings.
"There are more items in the book category than there are items in any other category, by far," he said.
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Bezos was aware of the challenges of getting noticed in those early internet days and declared that "attention is the scarce commodity of the late 20th century."
"We did it by doing something new and innovative for the first time, that actually has real value for the customer," he said.
On July 16, 1995, Amazon officially opened to the public, selling its first book, Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies: Computer Models of the Fundamental Mechanisms of Thought by Douglas Hofstadter for $27.95 to John Wainwright, a computer scientist, who was testing the beta site.
In the first two months of business, Amazon sold to all 50 states and over 45 countries. Within two months, sales reached $20,000 per week.
The company took off from this point and eventually grew into an e-commerce giant with a nearly $3 trillion market cap.
Amazon now owns a wide range of businesses, including Whole Foods Market, home security company Ring, robotaxi developer Zoox, and Roomba-maker iRobot.
And Bezos, who also founded space company Blue Origin, is one of the richest people in the world.
Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services
Amazon's IPO & subsequent growth
The company's rapid expansion has been labeled the "Amazon Effect," describing the disruption of global retail by e-commerce.
The company held its initial public offering (IPO) on May 15, 1997, at $18 per share.
"Amazon.com intends to use technology to deliver an outstanding service offering and to achieve the significant economies inherent in the online store model," the company said in a filing with the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission.
The filing noted that from December 31, 1995, to March 31, 1997, Amazon expanded from 11 to 256 employees.
As of late 2025, the company employs about 1.58 million people worldwide - roughly the population of Philadelphia - making Amazon the world's second-largest private employer behind Walmart (WMT).
Related: History of Apple: Company timeline and facts
Amazon expanded beyond books in 1998 by launching music (CDs) and acquiring the Internet Movie Database (IMDb), marking its shift toward becoming an "everything store."
The company launched Amazon Prime, a paid subscription service that offers fast free shipping, streaming, and exclusive discounts in 2005. As of late 2025, Amazon Prime had over 200 million subscribers globally.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) launched in 2006, with early services such as S3 and EC2 laying the foundation for the modern cloud computing industry.
Amazon launched its video service in 2006 under the name "Amazon Unbox," later rebranded as Prime Video.
Amazon introduced the Kindle e-reader in 2007 to dominate the growing digital book market and protect its core bookselling business. Kindle now controls more than 80% of the U.S. e-book market.
The company entered entertainment in 2010 with Amazon Studios to develop original films and series, competing with streaming rivals like Netflix (NFLX).
Amazon Studios, later renamed Amazon MGM Studios following its merger with MGM Holdings, has produced titles including The Boys, Reacher, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.
Amazon in the AI era
AWS is Amazon's biggest profit driver, consistently generating more than 50% of its operating income and holding roughly one-third of the global cloud infrastructure market, ahead of Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.
Andy Jassy has served as Amazon's CEO since July 2021, succeeding founder Jeff Bezos. He previously led AWS from 2016 to 2021.
"We have never seen a technology grow as rapidly as AI," Jassy told analysts during the company's 2026 first-quarter earnings call. "Amazon is already a leader, and companies continue to choose AWS for AI."
To illustrate AWS's growth, Jassy noted the platform had a $58 million revenue run rate three years after launch.
"In the first three years of this AI wave, AWS's AI revenue run rate is over $15 billion - nearly 260 times larger," he said.
Amazon's stock & financials
In 2025, Amazon reported net income of $77.7 billion, or $7.17 per share, up from $59.2 billion, or $5.53 per share.
Amazon has completed four stock splits, beginning with a 2-for-1 split in June 1998 and culminating in a 20-for-1 split in June 2022. The company does not pay a dividend.
Related: Microsoft's logo over the years: A timeline of innovation
The company joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average on February 26, 2024, replacing Walgreens Boots Alliance, increasing the index's consumer and retail exposure.
Analysts currently rate Amazon a strong buy, driven by AI-led demand for AWS, expanding advertising profitability, and a solid retail outlook.
A timeline of Amazon's milestones
July 5, 1994: Jeff Bezos founds Amazon.com as an online bookstore.
May 15, 1997: Amazon holds its IPO at a price of $18 per share.
April 17, 2005: The company launches Amazon Prime, a paid subscription service.
March 14, 2006: Amazon Web Services (AWS) launches.
Nov. 16, 2010: Amazon Studios launches.
Related: History of Walmart: Company timeline & facts
August 28, 2017: Amazon acquires Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion in an all-cash deal.
Nov. 19, 2007: The first Amazon Kindle is released.
Dec.14, 2016: Prime Video is launched globally
Sept. 4, 2018: Amazon reaches $1 trillion market cap.
June 26, 2020: Amazon acquires robotaxi company Zoox as a wholly owned subsidiary for over $1.2 billion.
May 26, 2021: Amazon announces its acquisition of MGM.
Feb. 26, 2024: The company joins the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
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This story was originally published May 6, 2026 at 5:16 PM.