Amazon launches Surprise! An e-card app for sending Amazon gift cards

Amazon launches Surprise! An e-card app for sending Amazon gift cards

Amazon just made it easier to send last-minute gifts — provided that it’s an Amazon gift card.

On Wednesday, the company launched Surprise! a new app for sending free personalized e-cards and Amazon gift cards to contacts in your address book.

Log into Surprise with an existing Amazon account, and it lets you to choose the occasion and type of card you want to send. The categories are pretty typical of what you would find in most greeting-card aisles — including birthday, Christmas, new baby, anniversary and more — and each type has a generic or personalized option available.

The “simple” version allows you to attach a gift card, write a quick note and add a signature, while the personalized version also lets you add photos, video or audio. After you create the e-card, and schedule a delivery time, you can add an animated video that helps the recipient “unwrap” the card upon delivery.

You don’t have to send an Amazon gift card with the e-cards, though one is added to most cards by default. If you do add one, however, the app charges the default credit or debit card associated with your Amazon account, so you never need to re-enter the information.

Surprise is free and available now for iOS, Android, and is also in the Amazon Appstore.