Amazon to Close Nearly All Go and Fresh Stores by February

Amazon says it will close most of its Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh grocery stores across the United States by February 1, 2026, as it shifts strategy toward online grocery delivery and its Whole Foods Market chain.

The move marks the end of a high‑profile experiment with its own branded physical grocery stores.

End of an experiment

Amazon launched its Amazon Go stores in 2018 in order to promote a cashier-free shopping experience. The bigger Amazon Fresh stores offered a wide range of groceries, similar to regular supermarkets, Customers could “Just Walk Out” with their purchases thanks to sensors and cameras.

According to reports, the business said that despite years of investment, the outlets could not provide “a truly distinctive customer experience with the right economic model needed for large-scale expansion.”

Consequently, all 57 Amazon Fresh and 15 Amazon Go stores will close, with the majority closing on Sunday, February 1, 2026. Due to local labor rules mandating early warning, stores in California will stay open longer.

What’s next for Amazon’s grocery strategy?

According to sources, instead of completely leaving the food industry, Amazon is concentrating on other areas of the company:

• As more consumers place fresh food orders online, it intends to extend its grocery delivery services, including quick same-day deliveries to additional cities.
• Amazon’s primary physical grocery brand will be the Whole Foods Market chain, which it acquired in 2017 and currently has over 550 locations. In the upcoming years, Amazon plans to open over 100 more Whole Foods locations.
• It’s possible that some of the shutting Amazon Go and Fresh outlets will be transformed into Whole Foods stores or into new hybrid formats that include Whole Foods and Amazon products.

The business says it would keep experimenting with new retail formats, such as supercenter-style stores that combine groceries with general items and “store-within-a-store” models at certain locations.

Impact on workers and customers

Thousands of workers in physical stores will be impacted by the closures. However, Amazon claims to provide assistance, including severance pay and efforts to move employees within its larger network of companies.

Customers will still be able to shop for groceries online with Amazon Fresh delivery, and the Just Walk Out technology developed in Amazon Go stores will continue to be used in other contexts, such as third-party websites and Amazon fulfillment centers.

What this means for shoppers

The closures represent a change in how people purchase food, according to many consumers. Fast, app-based delivery services are becoming more and more popular, a trend that picked up speed during the epidemic and doesn’t seem to be slowing down.

The shift may seem sudden to people who liked the convenience of nearby Amazon Fresh or Go stores.

However, it is part of a larger plan by Amazon to give priority to services with more demand and more room for expansion.