The best e-commerce platform for selling through AI shopping assistants

Shopify's Help Center documents direct checkout in Microsoft Copilot as activated by default for eligible stores, and its ChatGPT page says product discovery is active by default on the same terms. We crown Shopify for selling through AI shopping assistants on that default: a store selling eligible products to US shoppers has both routes switched on once it has agreed to Shopify's supplemental terms and completed its store policies. Microsoft's own merchant page for Copilot Checkout lists Shopify merchants as enrolled automatically.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud suits a merchant already running B2C Commerce whose staff want to configure the OpenAI catalog feed in Business Manager and keep the checkout they operate. commercetools suits a merchant that wants checkout inside ChatGPT through Stripe's Agentic Commerce Suite and is prepared to buy the AI Hub add-on and qualify with Stripe.

What decides AI assistant sales on a commerce platform

Microsoft Advertising's page on agentic commerce names Stripe's Agentic Commerce Suite and PayPal Store Sync as partner routes into Copilot Checkout, alongside the automatic enrollment, with no extra onboarding, that it lists for Shopify. The route your platform uses decides whether your catalog is switched on without setup or waits on a feed your staff configure and a partner's approval. It also decides who controls what is sent: a default shares the catalog the platform already holds, and a configured feed lets staff map fields and filter products first.

OpenAI's product discovery announcement said merchants with product listings in ChatGPT use their own checkout, and Google's developer overview of its Universal Commerce Protocol documents both a native checkout and a cart transfer back to the merchant's site. A referral leaves the sale in the checkout you already run, with its apps and delivery options, and an in-assistant payment saves the buyer a step under the channel's own rules. Gartner's consumer survey release recommends shopping tools for product research, price comparison, deals and narrowing choices, so a discovery route has value before any assistant takes a payment.

Google's Merchant Center help says UCP-powered checkout is available to select merchants, and the developer overview requires Google's approval before an integration goes live. The Microsoft page limits Copilot Checkout to English-language merchants selling to US buyers in USD. Each platform's connector adds conditions of its own, so a store qualifies only where the channel's rule and the connector's rule both admit it.

commercetools' channel guide counts each SKU once for every AI channel it is synchronized to, against a contracted usage limit, and Shopify's Copilot page states no fee for selling in the channel beyond standard payment processing. A catalog on the first model uses more of its contracted units with each channel added, and a store on the second pays when an order is processed.

Shopify's announcement of its agentic storefronts names KEEN and Pura Vida as merchants using Copilot Checkout. Ask each vendor whether a customer it names is running a live checkout in the assistant or is at an earlier stage, such as discovery testing or a planned deployment.

Shopify, Salesforce Commerce Cloud and commercetools in AI assistants

Shopify: default connection for eligible stores and direct checkout in Copilot

Shopify's overview of agentic storefronts says the feature is active by default for eligible stores, with products reaching the AI channels through Shopify Catalog. On ChatGPT that means product discovery: a shopper who wants to buy is sent to the store's own checkout, in an in-app browser or a new tab. An eligible store sells to customers in the US and can be based outside the country. It also has to agree to Shopify's supplemental terms for agentic storefronts and complete its store policies.

In Microsoft Copilot, the Help Center page documents direct checkout as activated by default for eligible stores. The shopper buys inside Copilot with a credit or debit card, and a merchant who deactivates the feature sends buyers to the online store. Direct checkout displays only to customers based in the US.

Shopify documents direct checkout in Google AI Mode and Gemini on the same default, and its page describes the channel as rolling out to eligible stores and to Google users. That route asks for a US-based store selling to US customers, plus a valid Google Merchant Center account with the store's products in it.

Shopify lists subscriptions, product bundles, customizable products and B2B-only products as unsupported in Copilot and Google direct checkout, along with local delivery and pickup, and a sign-in requirement before checkout. Google Analytics and custom pixels do not fire there, and Shopify sends server-to-server events when a checkout starts and completes. Shopify fits less well for a merchant whose catalog is mostly subscriptions or bundles, because direct checkout leaves those products out.

A merchant on another commerce platform can use Shopify's Agentic plan, which has no monthly subscription fee and lists products in Shopify Catalog for the AI channels. On that plan direct checkout is deactivated by default, and publishing a Shopify online store or selling through its checkout takes a paid plan.

In its January 2026 announcement, Shopify quotes Sam Buckingham, KEEN's director of global digital product, describing the company as "one of the first Shopify brands to use Copilot Checkout." Shopify's enterprise blog reports that AI-referred orders grew nearly 13 times year over year in the first quarter of 2026, a Shopify-wide count of orders referred by AI with no split by assistant.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud: catalog feeds your team configures in Business Manager

Salesforce's July 2026 release of B2C Commerce added a catalog feed integration with OpenAI that staff set up in Business Manager without custom code. They map B2C Commerce fields to OpenAI's catalog standards and filter the eligible products, and the feed then syncs daily. The August 2026 release added a feed for Google Merchant Center on the same pattern, with a preview of the feed before the daily sync is turned on.

Gordon Evans, chief marketing officer of Salesforce Commerce Cloud, told Digital Commerce 360 that the partnership with OpenAI "is around the product catalog syndication, so the checkout would happen on the merchant's site." He named Crocs and Pacsun among the retailers in Salesforce's pilot with OpenAI. For a merchant on B2C Commerce, that keeps a ChatGPT referral inside the checkout the team already runs.

Salesforce's announcement with Google Cloud lists the catalog feed integration with Google as generally available and schedules its Universal Commerce Protocol integration, the route to checkout on Google surfaces, for general availability in October 2026. Under that integration merchants keep payments and order management on the commerce infrastructure they already operate.

Salesforce's pricing page lists its Commerce Cloud editions as contact for pricing. The feed workflow belongs to B2C Commerce, so its buyer is a merchant already on that platform.

commercetools: AI Hub channels and a Stripe checkout route into ChatGPT

commercetools announced AI Hub as generally available and supported for production use on July 30, 2026. It is sold as an add-on: the offering page says add-ons carry additional terms and pricing, and the channel guide tells customers to reach their Customer Success Manager for access. A merchant then creates channels for Google, OpenAI or Stripe's Agentic Commerce Suite in commercetools Merchant Center.

The OpenAI module syncs product data to ChatGPT for discovery, and the shopper completes the purchase on the merchant's own storefront or app. It requires a merchant application approved by OpenAI, which onboards merchants in waves.

The Stripe Agentic Commerce Suite integration is the checkout route, with agentic checkout documented through agents including ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot and the orders returned to commercetools. It is open to merchants that use Stripe as their payment provider and have been accepted from Stripe's waitlist, which Stripe reviews on a rolling basis. The merchant then selects its channels in the Stripe Dashboard and tests the flow before going live.

The Google module covers product feeds to Google Merchant Center and Universal Commerce Protocol checkout with Google Pay on Google Search and Gemini, with the order created in commercetools. Its documentation limits availability to eligible US retailers during the initial rollout and asks for a Merchant Center account in good standing and an expression of interest through Google's form.

The channel guide counts each SKU once for every AI channel it is synchronized to, so one SKU on two channels uses two units of the contracted limit. The AI Hub product page sends pricing questions to sales.

JD Sports signed on as the first enterprise retailer to deploy Stripe's suite, according to commercetools' January 2026 press release. Frasers Group announced a partnership to deploy AI Hub across Sports Direct, FLANNELS and FRASERS. Both announcements describe deployments the retailers have committed to.

Which e-commerce platform is best for selling through AI shopping assistants?

We crown Shopify for a merchant selling eligible products to US shoppers who wants the shortest documented path from catalog to assistant. Discovery in ChatGPT and direct checkout in Copilot are on by default for eligible stores, with no channel fee beyond payment processing, and Shopify names merchants already using that checkout.

Shopify trails on ChatGPT, where its connector returns the buyer to the store, and its Google checkout is still rolling out to US-based stores. commercetools documents a separate checkout route into ChatGPT through Stripe. We weigh the default more heavily because it connects an eligible store to two assistants without a feed to build or an approval to wait for, and the Stripe route waits on an add-on purchase and a waitlist.

Salesforce Commerce Cloud is the better pick when you already run B2C Commerce and want your own staff deciding what the assistants see. The OpenAI and Google feeds are configured in Business Manager with field mapping and product filters, and buyers finish in the checkout you already operate, so the storefront stays where it is.

commercetools is the better pick when checkout inside the assistant matters more to you than setup time, in ChatGPT above all. Its Stripe route documents checkout in ChatGPT, where the Shopify and Salesforce connectors send the buyer back to the merchant's site. It suits a merchant that uses Stripe for payments and is ready to buy the AI Hub add-on and qualify through Stripe's waitlist.

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