Online pharmacies are pharmacies which operate over the net. Many such pharmacies are, in some ways, much the same as community pharmacies; the principal difference is how the drugs are purchased and delivered. Some customers consider this to be more advantageous than traveling to a community drugstore.

While many internet pharmacies sell prescription meds only with a prescription, some do not demand a pre-written prescription. In some countries, this is because prescriptions are not required. Some customers purchase drugs from such pharmacies to avoid the disadvantage of visiting a doctor or to get meds which their physicians were unwilling to prescribe. People living in the United States may go to online pharmacies because health care and prescription medications can be prohibitively expensive. Lots of these websites employ their own in house physicians to review the medication order and write a prescription accordingly. Some websites sell medications without a prescription or a doctor review.

In the United States, there has been a influence to legalize importation of meds from Canada and a number of European countries, in order to decrease consumer costs. Many times Americans buy lower-cost foreign meds by driving to Canadian pharmacies, buying their medications when traveling overseas on vacation, or, buying from Canadian pharmacies that ship their orders via mail.