The Maze: Amazon’s retail-media advantage is about more than audience size. Its advertising revenue per user reached a stated $275 in 2025, up from roughly $155 in 2021 in Andreas Reiffen’s comparison. Walmart, Target, eBay, Etsy and Kroger sit far below it. That makes monetization per shopper a useful question for retailers. It also makes the definition of “user” a rather expensive footnote: the comparison does not disclose that definition or its geographic scope.
Amazon’s lead widened while its own monetization climbed. The estimated path moves from about $155 in 2021 through $170, $205 and $235 before reaching the stated $275 endpoint. Those intermediate readings are approximate, but the direction is clear. The business is extracting more advertising revenue per measured user over time. That can matter even without adding another shopper: an audience can generate more commercial value when advertisers pay more to reach it, buy more placements or participate more frequently. These are possible mechanisms, not findings established by the comparison. It cannot separate better relevance from higher prices or heavier advertising load.
Improvement at smaller rivals does not automatically close the gap. Walmart’s line rises from around $10 to the low twenties. eBay also trends upward, while Etsy and Kroger remain near the bottom of the range. Target falls sharply after 2021 before recovering gradually. Several businesses can therefore improve their own monetization while Amazon pulls further away in absolute dollars. A high growth rate from a small base is compatible with a widening competitive gap. For a retailer allocating technology investment, the useful distinction is between getting better than last year and becoming more competitive with the market leader.
The strongest headline needs a correction. Reiffen’s post describes the other retailers as below $25 per user. Yet Target’s 2021 position is roughly $38, and its 2025 endpoint appears slightly above $25. The defensible claim is a large gap, not an exact elevenfold advantage over every rival or an unbroken five-year ceiling. Likewise, moving from roughly $155 to $275 is substantial growth, but less than a literal doubling. These distinctions do not erase Amazon’s lead. They stop an attractive benchmark from turning into a precision instrument that its evidence cannot support.
Revenue per user is a diagnostic, not a profit target. A retailer must first decide which users count and what advertising revenue belongs in the numerator. Mixing shoppers with visitors, or different advertising businesses, can move the ratio without improving the underlying operation. The source publisher, Pentaleap, sells technology that ranks sponsored and organic products together; that supplies relevant industry context, not independent validation of the numbers. Operators should compare consistent definitions, then test whether additional advertising earns incremental revenue without hurting shopping conversion. Brands need a different test: whether the spend generates profitable additional sales. A retailer earning more from an audience does not, by itself, prove that advertisers receive more value from it.
Why it matters: Amazon sets a demanding reference point, but copying its dollar figure would skip the hard work. Retailers need consistent measurement and evidence that extra ad revenue survives the cost of lost purchases or weaker shopper trust. Advertisers need incremental sales, not a retailer’s impressive monetization ratio. The useful management question is how much more value the same audience can create—and how much of that value remains after everyone has paid their bill.
