Prime Highlights
- Perplexity will introduce a free agentic shopping feature next week, allowing users to complete purchases directly within its search engine.
- The tool uses AI to streamline the shopping experience, offering personalized results and leveraging memory from past searches.
Key Facts
- Perplexity is partnering with PayPal, enabling shopping from over 5,000 merchants, with PayPal managing payments, customer service, and returns.
- The new feature builds on last year’s paid “Buy With Pro” test and competes with AI-driven e-commerce tools like OpenAI’s Instant Checkout.
Background
Perplexity announced it will introduce a free agentic shopping product for U.S. users next week as holiday spending increases. The new feature will allow people to buy items directly from the answers they receive inside Perplexity’s search engine, making the shopping process faster and more convenient.
Dmitry Shevelenko, Perplexity’s chief business officer, said the “agentic” part of the tool refers to the ability to complete a purchase without leaving the platform. He added that many users still want to do their own research but prefer a simpler and more streamlined experience.
Perplexity has partnered with PayPal for the rollout. Users will eventually be able to shop from more than 5,000 merchants supported by PayPal. The company first tested its shopping capabilities last year through a paid feature called “Buy With Pro.” The new free version will offer improved detection of shopping intent and more personalised results, using memory from a user’s past searches.
The company did not say whether it will earn revenue from purchases made on its platform.
The move comes as competition in AI-driven e-commerce grows. OpenAI launched Instant Checkout in September, enabling ChatGPT users to buy items directly within the chatbot. OpenAI has partnerships with Etsy, Shopify, and PayPal, and plans to let PayPal users buy and sell through ChatGPT starting next year.
PayPal’s head of agentic strategy, Michelle Gill, said the company has been preparing for this new phase of online shopping by building infrastructure and protections. She noted that PayPal aims to stay connected to consumers and merchants as they use new AI platforms.
Perplexity confirmed that PayPal merchants will act as the merchants of record, managing customer service, payments, and returns. PayPal’s buyer protection policies will also apply to purchases made through Perplexity.
Gill said the timing of the launch is ideal as holiday shopping activity increases.
