Japan makes Amazon show offers its outside-price test left off the page

The Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) approved a commitment plan from Amazon Japan G.K. on November 11, 2026. The plan deals with what happens when Amazon's price test leaves a product page with no Featured Offer, the offer shown at the top of the page with the Add to Cart and Buy Now buttons. Once the new display launches, Amazon Japan has to show the cheapest purchasable offer instead of showing nothing, according to reporting by MediaNama, PPC Land and Jiji Press.

This is a Japanese case, but the mechanism isn't. Amazon's US stores run a version of the same test: if your item is cheaper at another major retailer, your Amazon offer can lose the Featured Offer. When that happens on a hero ASIN during a promotion, conversion suffers, and in our experience the price that caused it was often set by the brand or a retailer somewhere else.

We couldn't open the JFTC's own release: its website blocked our requests. The details below come from three outlets that read it, and where they disagree we say so.

Key facts#

What the Japan Fair Trade Commission looked at#

The Japan Fair Trade Commission reviewed how Amazon Japan has decided Featured Offer eligibility since September 2019. A seller qualified only if its selling price was at or below what Amazon calls the Competitive Price, which MediaNama describes from the JFTC's documents as the lowest price for the same product across a considerable number of online stores Amazon treats as substitutes. Under the test, selling price means the product price plus shipping, minus points granted on the purchase. That's the definition used for Amazon Japan's test.

If no seller passed that test, no offer appeared in the Featured Offer slot at all, including the cheapest offer in Amazon's store, PPC Land and MediaNama reported. According to PPC Land's translation, the commission said that from the shopper's point of view, "it is as if the product were not being sold."

The commission's concern was that the rule could pressure sellers on price. In its competition-law assessment, quoted by MediaNama from the JFTC's tentative English translation, the commission said the conduct "may restrict sellers' freedom to set their prices." It reviewed the conduct under Article 19 of the Antimonopoly Act. The JFTC doesn't name the rival sites in its documents, according to PPC Land.

What Amazon Japan agreed to change#

Amazon Japan's plan has nine measures, PPC Land reported. The one shoppers will see is the first: when no offer qualifies for the Featured Offer, Amazon Japan must show the lowest-priced purchasable offer on the product page, with its price including shipping, its delivery terms, who ships it and who sells it, and a way to buy it. MediaNama reports the commission wants that shown "in a manner readily visible to consumers."

The other measures are about making it stick. Amazon Japan has to explain the display on its help pages for sellers and shoppers, notify sellers and relevant staff, adopt a compliance code on seller pricing with periodic training and legal audits, and hand monitoring to a third party the commission approves. That monitor reports to the commission every year for five years.

The sources differ on timing. Jiji Press reports that Amazon Japan will update its product pages within six months. PPC Land says the release doesn't disclose the deadline or name the monitor, and MediaNama says the commission set deadlines for individual measures without listing them.

They also differ on the price test. Jiji Press reports that Amazon will revise its rule that sellers must match or undercut the lowest prices on other sites. PPC Land's reading of the nine measures is that none of them refers to the eligibility test itself, and that a seller priced above the Competitive Price is in the same position as before. Until Amazon Japan's help pages describe the new display, we'd treat the test as unchanged.

Does the Amazon Japan decision find that Amazon broke the law?#

No. The Japan Fair Trade Commission approved the plan under its commitment procedure, which closes an investigation without a finding that the company violated the Antimonopoly Act, without a cease-and-desist order and without a surcharge. MediaNama reports that if Amazon Japan doesn't carry out the plan, the commission can rescind its approval under Article 48-5(1) and resume the investigation.

How the same test works on Amazon in the US#

Amazon's US stores use a competitive price too. In Amazon's own seller guidance from October 18, 2024, "the competitive price is the lowest price for an item from other major retailers outside Amazon," and a seller's price plus shipping should be at or below it to count as competitively priced. Amazon's Pricing Health page shows offers that aren't eligible for the Featured Offer.

The Japan decision doesn't change any of that in the US. In the US, Amazon's pricing practices are part of the Federal Trade Commission's monopolization case, filed with 17 states on September 26, 2023. The FTC's announcement says the complaint alleges "anti-discounting measures that punish sellers and deter other online retailers from offering prices lower than Amazon". Those are allegations, and the case hasn't gone to trial.

Our read: the price test matters more than the remedy#

Sell Through's read is that the useful part of this decision for a US brand is the description of the problem, not the fix. As PPC Land reads it, Japan's regulator left the outside-price test alone and changed what the shopper sees when it bites. Amazon's US stores use the same kind of test, and the price that trips it is often one the brand controls.

On the accounts we run, a lost Featured Offer on a top ASIN usually starts off Amazon. It's often a DTC promo code that a price tracker picks up, a retailer matching a competitor during an event, or a reseller clearing inventory on another marketplace. Ads keep spending, the offer can't convert the way it did, and the account looks like it has an advertising problem when it has a pricing one.

That's why we treat cross-channel pricing as part of channel control rather than something the Amazon team finds out about afterward. We've written about pricing unauthorized resellers off your listings, and the same discipline applies to your own promotions. With Black Friday Week running November 19 to 30, 2026, the two weeks of the event are when that coordination pays for itself.

What to do before Black Friday Week starts on November 19#