4 minutes
Agentic Commerce Report 2026 Trend 2: AI agents are expected to gain purchase share
Consumers expect to buy more through AI agents every year. No other channel shows the same climb.
Susan Jackson
Lead, Product & Technology Thought Leadership
Susan Jackson leads thought leadership and content strategy for Global Payments, shaping narratives on agentic commerce, payments innovation, optimisation and emerging technologies for business and technical audiences.
Key points
- AI agents are the only purchase channel that consumers expect to use more at every time horizon: today, in 12 months and in five years.
- The share of consumers who expect to make more than 10% of their purchases through an AI agent rises from 27% today to 40% in five years.
- In five years, consumers expect 17% of their purchases to go through AI agents, close to in-store shopping at 18%.
- China leads at every horizon. Australia is the most cautious, but the share of Australians expecting no agent purchases still falls, from 56% today to 45% in five years.
A UK shopper looking for a new washing machine asked Google Gemini to compare prices and models. "I found this extremely helpful as I didn't need to open up loads of different sites," they told us.
This is the second trend in our Agentic Commerce Report series. As consumers rely on agents instead of visiting sites one by one, more spending is likely to follow. Across all seven markets, consumers expect AI agents to account for a growing share of their purchases.
Agent shopping has already started
Agentic commerce is still small, but it's growing. 58% of consumers expect to make at least some of their purchases through an AI agent today. Only 42% expect to make none.
Consumers who have already shopped with AI mostly use it for early tasks:
- Compare prices: 61%
- Find or research a product or service: 56%
- Get a personalised recommendation: 52%
- Complete a purchase or payment: 31%
Many go straight from the agent's answer to a purchase. "I used Rufus on Amazon… I used Gemini 3 to look up some good products. It returned useful results and I bought one of the results," said a US consumer. A consumer in Australia described a simple routine: "I send a link to an eBay search, then I ask ChatGPT to find the best deals for me."
Where consumers expect to spend
We asked consumers what share of their purchases they expect to make through each channel. The table shows the percentage who expect to make more than 10% of purchases through each one:
Channel | Today | In 12 months | In 5 years |
|---|---|---|---|
AI agent | 27% | 35% | 40% |
In person/in store | 45% | 42% | 38% |
Company or brand website | 35% | 36% | 35% |
Online marketplace | 35% | 35% | 34% |
Search | 34% | 35% | 33% |
In-app via mobile or device | 30% | 31% | 30% |
Social media or livestream | 16% | 17% | 16% |
AI agent use rises over time, while in-store shopping declines. The other channels change very little.
Expected purchase share tells the same story. Consumers expect about 11–13% of their purchases to go through AI agents today and 12–14% in 12 months. In five years, that share reaches 17%.
The five-year view
Five years out, consumers expect to spread their purchases like this:
- In store: 18%
- AI agent: 17%
- Company website: 13%
- Search: 12%
- Online marketplace: 12%
- In-app: 12%
- Social media or livestream: 6%
No channel reaches even a fifth of expected spending. Shoppers expect to spread purchases across more channels, with AI agents gaining the most ground.
Expectations have moved quickly. In 2025, consumers expected AI agents to handle 10% of purchases in five years. In-store shopping fell from 37% of expected five-year spending in 2025 to 18% in 2026. Part of that drop comes from the longer channel list: in-app and social media weren't options in the 2025 survey.
Market differences
China leads at every horizon. Chinese consumers expect about 15% of their purchases to go through agents today and 25% in five years. The share of Chinese consumers expecting more than 10% of purchases through an agent climbs from 35% today to 59% in five years. Brazil follows, rising from 33% to 43%.
The most cautious markets are moving too, just from a lower starting point:
- Australia: Consumers expecting no agent purchases fall from 56% today to 45% in five years.
- France: From 50% to 39%.
- US: From 46% to 39%.
Around four in ten consumers in these markets still expect to make no purchases through agents five years from now. Even so, adoption is growing from today's lower starting point.
What's drawing shoppers to agents
Price is the biggest draw: 69% of consumers say finding the best price would motivate them to use agentic commerce. Time savings and finding well-reviewed options come next, both at 63%.
'AI agents are the only channel expected to grow at every time horizon.'
Agents can also change which products people buy. When an agent recommends an alternative that is cheaper and better reviewed than their favorite name brand, 72% of consumers say they would consider trying it. That figure is 94% in China. In the US (62%) and Australia (59%), consumers are the most loyal to their usual brands, yet a majority would still try the alternative.
What merchants need to know
- Revisit channel plans. Consumer expectations for where they'll spend changed a lot in one year. Budgets built on last year's assumptions may already be out of date.
- Make your catalog readable to agents. When shoppers stop opening many different sites, the agent decides which products they see. Clear product data, pricing and reviews help keep you on the shortlist.
- Plan for the consumer's own agent. Early data shows slightly more trust in personal AI assistants (44%) than in agents provided by retailers (37%). Checkout and data systems need to work with whichever agent a shopper brings.
- Compete on value you can show. Agents surface cheaper, better-reviewed alternatives, and most consumers are willing to try them. Brand loyalty on its own offers less protection.
- Sequence by market. China and Brazil are ready now. The US, France and Australia are moving more slowly.
The bigger picture
AI agents won't replace other channels any time soon. Consumers expect to spread their spending widely, with no single channel dominating. Still, agents are the only channel expected to grow at every time horizon. In five years, consumers expect to spend nearly as much through agents as they do in physical stores.
Read the full report
Download the full report for complete market and category findings. Then follow our Insights series. Next up: Consumers hesitate for different reasons.
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