Shopify Now Lets AI Buy Your Products Without You Knowing

February 12, 2026

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Shopify Now Lets AI Buy Your Products Without You Knowing

Shopify merchants woke up this winter to a fundamental shift in how their products reach buyers. The platform quietly activated technology that allows artificial intelligence platforms to browse stores, evaluate inventory, and complete purchases entirely on their own.

Agentic Storefronts, launched in Shopify’s Winter ’26 Edition alongside roughly 150 new features, transforms ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, and Perplexity from research tools into autonomous shopping agents. These AI systems now make purchasing decisions using structured merchant data, with completed orders flowing directly into store backends without human intervention at checkout.

The Mechanics Behind Autonomous AI Purchases

Shopify built infrastructure that feeds product catalogs, pricing, and real-time inventory status directly to major AI platforms. When someone asks ChatGPT about waterproof hiking boots or queries Google Gemini for sustainable water bottles, these systems can now surface Shopify products, compare specifications, and execute transactions within the same conversation window.

The technology relies on:

Universal Commerce Platform integration with Google’s AI Mode and Gemini app
Microsoft Copilot Checkout for completing transactions inside Microsoft’s AI interface
An upcoming ChatGPT sales channel co-developed with Google as an open standard

Merchants don’t need custom integrations or special storefronts. Their existing product data automatically becomes discoverable to AI agents that can close sales during natural language exchanges.

Early adopters including Keen Footwear, Pura Vida, Monos, Gymshark, and Everlane already process revenue through these AI channels. Sam Buckingham, Director of Global Digital Product at KEEN, described his company as helping “define this new sales channel” through Copilot Checkout implementation. The footwear brand now captures transactions initiated and completed entirely within Microsoft’s AI interface.

Why Shopify Prioritized This Integration

Vanessa Lee, VP of Product at Shopify, framed the move around changing discovery patterns. Shopping increasingly happens in AI conversations rather than through traditional search engines or social media ads, she explained. Platforms that can’t serve products during these exchanges risk becoming invisible to buyers who expect instant purchasing options without leaving chat interfaces.

Nayna Sheth, Head of Product for Agentic Payments at Microsoft, noted that shoppers now expect “to go from search to purchase in a single conversation”, capturing peak intent before interest fades.

The shift also addresses AI’s reliability problem. Conversational platforms frequently hallucinate product details or pricing when scraping websites. Shopify’s structured data feeds eliminate these errors by providing authoritative inventory and specifications directly to AI systems.

The company evolved its merchant infrastructure from serving search engine feeds to powering fully conversational storefronts where AI acts as both salesperson and checkout clerk.

Transaction Volume and Verification Challenges

Store owners now process orders they didn’t actively facilitate through traditional marketing or customer service touchpoints. AI agents evaluate products based on query context, comparing features and prices across multiple merchants before autonomously selecting items and completing payment.

This creates transaction volume from channels merchants can’t directly optimize through conventional SEO or ad targeting. The technology also introduces new verification considerations. Orders arrive without the typical customer journey signals like email opens, site visits, or cart abandonment patterns.

Analytics tracking requires adjustment since AI purchases don’t follow human browsing behavior. Traditional metrics such as:

Time-on-site
Pages-per-session
Conversion funnel drop-offs

don’t apply when algorithms make millisecond evaluations.

Inventory planning faces new complexity as AI agents might suddenly purchase multiple items based on conversational recommendations to users, creating demand spikes without the usual lead indicators from growing site traffic or abandoned carts.

Positioning for AI-Mediated Commerce

Merchants operating on Shopify now participate in agentic commerce whether they actively manage these channels or not. Product data quality becomes more critical since AI systems reject incomplete specifications or unreliable inventory counts.

Customer service protocols need expansion to address buyers who made purchases through AI intermediaries and may have limited awareness of the actual merchant behind the transaction. Order confirmation communications require clarity about transaction origins when customers discover purchases they initiated through casual AI conversations rather than deliberate shopping sessions.

The technology represents a broader platform strategy where commerce infrastructure serves both human and artificial buyers through the same backend systems. Small merchants gain distribution through major AI platforms without building individual integrations or meeting minimum sales thresholds typically required for new channel partnerships.