OpenAI is introducing Instant Checkout within ChatGPT, enabling users to purchase products directly in chat, starting with U.S. Etsy sellers and soon expanding to over a million Shopify merchants. This feature is powered by the Agentic Commerce Protocol, developed with Stripe, which facilitates seamless collaboration between AI agents, users, and businesses to complete purchases securely and efficiently.
Instant Checkout Experience
Users can ask shopping-related questions, receive organic, unsponsored product recommendations ranked by relevance, and buy supported items with a few taps without leaving ChatGPT. Payment options include cards on file and express payment methods. Orders and fulfillment remain managed by merchants through their existing systems, with ChatGPT acting as a secure intermediary. Merchants pay a small fee per purchase, but users face no extra costs or price changes. Product rankings consider factors like availability, price, quality, and whether Instant Checkout is enabled, without favoring those items.
The Agentic Commerce Protocol
This open standard enables AI agents and businesses to collaborate on purchases across platforms and payment processors without requiring backend changes. Merchants retain full control over customer relationships, handling fulfillment, returns, support, and communication as usual. Stripe users can enable agentic payments with minimal code, while others can participate via Stripe’s Shared Payment Token API or the Delegated Payments Spec, maintaining their current payment processors.
Security and User Control
Agentic commerce prioritizes trust by ensuring users explicitly confirm each purchase step, securing payments with encrypted tokens authorized only for specific amounts and merchants, and minimizing data sharing to only what is necessary with user consent.
Industry Collaboration and Future Outlook
OpenAI is open-sourcing the Agentic Commerce Protocol to encourage broader merchant and developer integration. Partners like Stripe emphasize the protocol’s role in building AI-powered commerce infrastructure. This launch represents an initial step toward a future where AI is central to product discovery, decision-making, and purchasing, connecting people and businesses in a new era of commerce.
