Amazon Standard Identification Number

The Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN) is a product identification number used by Amazon.com. Despite the name, it is not a "standard" in any real sense, and is valid only for referring to products within the Amazon.com network of sites.

Each product sold on Amazon.com is given a unique ASIN. For books with an ISBN, the ASIN and the ISBN are the same. Books without an ISBN and other products are also assigned ASINs. ASINs are also used for other items used by Amazon.com (and subsidiaries), such as businesses in the yellow pages (on A9.com) and OpenSearch feeds.

On Amazon's Web site, a product's Web address (URL) always contains its ASIN, and, given the ASIN, a user can construct the product's URL in the following manner (as of January 2005):

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/ASIN-VALUE-HERE

Therefore the URL on Amazon for the paperback of Strunk, White, and Roger Angell's The Elements of Style, 4th Edition, whose ISBN is 020530902X, is:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/020530902X/

A shorter form of the URL for most products is:

http://www.amazon.com/o/ASIN/ASIN-VALUE-HERE

So the URL for Elements of Style, 4th Edition would become:

http://www.amazon.com/o/ASIN/020530902X

See also

* Kimba Kano - Browser add-on for built-in ISBN and ASIN searching.}