The Rise of AI Shoppers: Agentic AI Takes Over Holiday Shopping

Agentic artificial intelligence is becoming the main way people shop online, especially during the busy holiday season. Unlike regular AI that just answers questions, agentic AI can make decisions, remember things about you, and take actions all by itself. This week, new reports and real shopping data showed that these smart AI helpers are now responsible for huge amounts of online sales. Major companies like Amazon, Walmart, Google, and Target are all racing to build better AI agents to help shoppers find exactly what they want.

How AI Agents Help You Shop

Amazon created an AI helper called Rufus that has become very popular with shoppers. Rufus is special because it can remember what products you like and what prices you saw before. When a product you want goes on sale, Rufus can automatically buy it for you without asking. This means you never miss a good deal. Stores that use Rufus are seeing amazing results - people using Rufus buy twice as much as normal customers.

Google has built AI agents that do even more amazing things. These AI helpers can make phone calls to stores to check if a product is in stock. They can show you multiple products side by side to help you compare prices. Google's AI has a special feature called "buy for me" that lets the AI actually make purchases for you using your Google Pay account. This takes away most of the work from shopping.

Walmart and Target in the United States are taking a different approach with AI-powered gift finders. If you want to buy a gift for someone, you tell the AI their age, hobbies, and what the gift is for. The AI then finds the perfect product for that person. This is really helpful during the holidays when everyone is buying gifts for family and friends.

The Numbers Show AI Is Working

The proof that agentic AI is changing shopping comes from the data. During Black Friday 2025, shoppers made $11.8 billion in purchases in a single day. But the most exciting number is how much AI is driving this shopping. Visits from AI assistants - basically people clicking from an AI tool to a store - went up by 758% compared to last year. That is a massive jump that shows millions of people are trusting AI to help them find things to buy.

A new report from a company called Bluefish came out this week analyzing how many times different stores and products appeared in AI answers. The report showed that GenAI recommended Best Buy more than any other store. This is important because it means Best Buy figured out how to show up when AI assistants recommend places to shop. The report also showed that different groups of shoppers - like people of different ages or with different budgets - saw different AI recommendations. This means AI is getting very good at showing each person exactly what they want.

AI Agents Learning What You Want

The most powerful thing about agentic AI is that it learns about you. When you talk to an AI shopping assistant, it learns what kinds of products you like, what brands you trust, and how much money you usually spend. The more you use the AI, the smarter it gets at finding things just for you. Some companies are planning to make this even stronger. Meta announced that starting December 16, when you talk to Meta's AI assistant, that conversation will help decide what ads and products you see in the future.

What This Means for Stores and Shoppers

This big change is making shopping faster and easier for regular shoppers, but it is making things harder for stores that don't use AI. If your store doesn't work with AI helpers, fewer people will find you. A research company called Bluefish found that stores need to manage their AI visibility differently for different groups of customers. That means stores can't just do one thing - they have to make sure their products show up correctly to AI assistants for all kinds of shoppers.

Experts are saying this might be the biggest change in how people shop since the internet started. Instead of you searching for products, products are being shown to you by smart AI agents. This is called a shift from "pull" shopping - where you search - to "push" shopping - where products are shown to you. The companies that figure out this new way first will make a lot of money.

What's Coming Next

Agentic AI is just getting started. Stores are testing new AI features almost every week. Google's agent can understand when you need something and do things without you asking. Some experts think AI agents will soon do even more - like buying things at the best price across many stores, or remembering things you bought before and knowing when you need them again. Right now, shoppers are in the early stages of trusting AI to help them shop. But by next year, many shoppers will probably let AI do most of the shopping work for them.