Google announced the Universal Commerce Protocol on 11th January 2026 at the National Retail Federation's annual conference, introducing an open standard for agentic commerce spanning the entire shopping journey from discovery and buying to post-purchase support. The protocol was co-developed with industry leaders including Shopify, Etsy, Wayfair, Target and Walmart, and endorsed by more than 20 others across the ecosystem, positioning Google to secure its role in the rapidly expanding AI-powered retail market where AI-powered tools and agentic commerce could represent a $3 trillion to $5 trillion opportunity globally by 2030, according to an October report from McKinsey.
The Universal Commerce Protocol establishes a common language for agents and systems to operate together across consumer surfaces, businesses and payment providers, enabling seamless interaction instead of requiring unique connections for every individual agent. The protocol will soon power a new checkout feature allowing users to buy directly from Google's AI Mode or Gemini App, with payment via Google Wallet initially, though the company plans to include other payment methods like PayPal in the future. New Salesforce data shows AI and agents drove approximately 20% of retail sales during the 2025 holiday season, whilst Adobe noted that traffic driven to seller sites by generative AI grew by 693.4% during the holiday season. Google also introduced Business Agent, allowing shoppers to chat with brands to address newer consumer behaviour which has shifted towards more conversational commerce, and Direct Offers, which will let retailers promote unique discounts if a user of the AI Mode chatbot expresses intent to buy something.
E-commerce has emerged as one of the major battlegrounds in the booming generative AI market, with Google facing off against OpenAI, Perplexity and Amazon, as OpenAI announced Instant Checkout in September, allowing users to buy products through ChatGPT whilst taking a fee from transactions. The Universal Commerce Protocol is built to work across verticals and is compatible with existing industry protocols like Agent2Agent, Agent Payments Protocol and Model Context Protocol, ensuring interoperability across the emerging agentic commerce ecosystem. However, a ChannelEngine study of 4,500 shoppers found that only 17% feel comfortable letting AI complete a purchase, suggesting consumer adoption remains a significant challenge despite the technological advances and industry backing for AI-powered shopping agents.
Sources:
1. https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/11/google-launches-universal-commerce-protocol-bets-on-ai-powered-retail.html
2. https://blog.google/products/ads-commerce/agentic-commerce-ai-tools-protocol-retailers-platforms/
3. https://www.axios.com/2026/01/11/google-shopify-ai-shopping-standard-nrf-2026
4. https://techcrunch.com/2026/01/11/google-announces-a-new-protocol-to-facilitate-commerce-using-ai-agents/
