What is ChatGPT Shopping, ChatGPT's shopping experience?

ChatGPT Shopping is not an OpenAI store or a separate app: it is what ChatGPT does when what you ask sounds like a purchase. Nor is it the same as ChatGPT Search, the web search it builds on, or the ads ChatGPT began testing in 2026. OpenAI simply calls it shopping in ChatGPT.⁠^{[1]OpenAI, page for merchants. Power product discovery in ChatGPT} For a store, the change is that a question like "I need a six-cup moka pot that works on induction" can end in a carousel of products with prices, reviews and a list of stores, and that your product gets into that list or not by routes that are not Google's.

What it includes

When a question has purchase intent, ChatGPT can show products with an image, details and links to the sites where you can buy them. OpenAI states that ChatGPT chooses those results on its own; they are not ads and do not depend on its commercial agreements. It chooses based on the question and the context of the conversation, including memory if it is turned on, and takes into account the structured metadata it receives from first-party and third-party providers, such as price or description.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search} When you open a product, it can show the stores that sell it, ranked by availability, price, quality and whether they are the manufacturer or the main seller.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search}

On top of that base, OpenAI has been adding pieces:

• Shopping research, since November 24, 2025: it asks questions to understand what you are looking for, researches the web for a few minutes and delivers a personalized buying guide. OpenAI says its results are organic, that it reads product pages directly from public store sites, and that it can get price and availability wrong.⁠^{[3]OpenAI (November 24, 2025). Introducing shopping research in ChatGPT}
• Visual shopping and comparison, since March 24, 2026: exploring products with images, uploading a photo to find similar ones and comparing options side by side with price, reviews and features, for the Free, Go, Plus and Pro plans.⁠^{[4]OpenAI (March 24, 2026). Powering Product Discovery in ChatGPT}
• Virtual try-on and library: a button to see how a garment or accessory looks from a selfie, and the option to save products in folders.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search}

How products arrive

OpenAI describes three routes, and they are not mutually exclusive:

The direct feed has its own specification: one row per item or variant, with nine required fields, and the recommendation of titles up to 150 characters and descriptions up to 5,000.⁠^{[5]OpenAI Developers. Products (Agentic Commerce, file upload specification)} The entry on the ChatGPT product feed goes into the detail. For access, OpenAI's page for merchants collects requests on a waitlist and announces a self-serve portal "later this year".⁠^{[1]OpenAI, page for merchants. Power product discovery in ChatGPT} And anyone who wants a deeper integration can build an app inside ChatGPT, as Walmart did, although OpenAI says most merchants start with the feed and that apps fit large merchants better.⁠^{[4]OpenAI (March 24, 2026). Powering Product Discovery in ChatGPT}⁠^{[1]OpenAI, page for merchants. Power product discovery in ChatGPT} An app like that connects through the MCP protocol and can include an MCP server when it needs to read live data or act in another system.⁠^{[6]OpenAI Developers. MCP server (ChatGPT plugins)}

What has changed in a year

On September 29, 2025, OpenAI launched Instant Checkout: US users could buy from US Etsy sellers without leaving the chat, and the merchant paid a small fee per completed purchase.⁠^{[7]OpenAI (September 29, 2025). Buy it in ChatGPT: Instant Checkout and the Agentic Commerce Protocol} On March 24, 2026, OpenAI acknowledged that first version did not give the flexibility it wanted and moved to letting merchants use their own checkout, while it focuses on product discovery.⁠^{[4]OpenAI (March 24, 2026). Powering Product Discovery in ChatGPT}

As of October 2026, the page for merchants puts it this way: OpenAI is moving away from a standalone Instant Checkout experience, the purchase is completed on the merchant's site or app, purchases that start in ChatGPT carry no fee, and shopping in ChatGPT works in the United States and will reach more regions.⁠^{[1]OpenAI, page for merchants. Power product discovery in ChatGPT} The help center still mentions that, for some eligible products and merchants, ChatGPT may offer Instant Checkout.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search}

The other novelty of the year is ads. Tests began in the United States on February 9, 2026, for the Free and Go plans; ads appear below the answer, marked as sponsored, and OpenAI states they do not influence what ChatGPT answers and that they run on systems separate from the model.⁠^{[8]OpenAI, help center. Ads in ChatGPT}

In a store

What a store can do today, depending on how its catalog reaches ChatGPT:

A store that is not on Shopify can delegate the technical part: Clione builds the feed from the enriched catalog and uploads it every day to the SFTP account OpenAI gives the merchant; whether the products appear and where is up to OpenAI.

How to check it

1. See how your catalog reaches ChatGPT: Shopify or Etsy, a direct feed or just the web.⁠^{[1]OpenAI, page for merchants. Power product discovery in ChatGPT}
2. If you are not on Shopify or Etsy, request access to the feed and validate each row against the nine required fields before sending it.⁠^{[5]OpenAI Developers. Products (Agentic Commerce, file upload specification)}
3. If you want to appear in shopping research, follow the allowlisting process that OpenAI links in its announcement.⁠^{[3]OpenAI (November 24, 2025). Introducing shopping research in ChatGPT}
4. Ask your customer's question in ChatGPT and open the product: note which stores appear, in what order and at what price, with the date.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search}
5. If you see wrong data for your product, report it from the product's own menu, which is the route OpenAI gives.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search}

Related concept: ChatGPT Search

ChatGPT Search is ChatGPT's web search: it rewrites the question, retrieves pages and answers citing them. ChatGPT Shopping is what is built on top when the question is about buying: instead of citations, products; instead of pages, product metadata that arrives from catalogs and feeds.⁠^{[2]OpenAI, help center. Shopping with ChatGPT Search} A store needs both: pages that can be read and cited, and product data that arrives complete. Above both is agentic commerce, the step where the assistant does not just recommend but buys.

To go further, ACP explains the protocol through which the feeds arrive, and the agentic commerce reading path orders the rest of the terms.