Amazon acquired IMDb in 1998. In April of that year, Jeff Bezos and Amazon reached a deal with IMDb founder Col Needham and other principal shareholders to buy the Internet Movie Database outright. The reported price was $55 million, and IMDb became an Amazon subsidiary.
IMDb began in 1990 as a fan-created database of film information, built around credits and searchable records. It was incorporated in the United Kingdom in 1996 as the Internet Movie Database Ltd., before Amazon’s acquisition two years later. Amazon saw value in IMDb not only as a popular entertainment reference but also as a way to support advertising and sales of DVDs and videotapes.
The acquisition connected Amazon with a large, specialized audience interested in films and television. IMDb continued operating under its own name and developed additional services, including IMDbPro and streaming-related products. A common mix-up is treating 1998 as IMDb’s founding year; the database had already existed for about eight years when Amazon bought it.