With holiday shopping on the horizon, OpenAI and Perplexity both announced AI shopping features integrated into their existing chatbots to help users research potential purchases. ChatGPT's shopping research began rolling out on mobile and web for logged-in users, whilst Perplexity's feature launched free for all US users. In addition to assistance with finding the right products, both platforms offer integrated checkout experiences designed to streamline the shopping journey. These announcements represent a significant shift in how major AI developers are positioning themselves within the e-commerce landscape.
Powered by a new GPT-5 mini model, ChatGPT's shopping feature conducts a directed search process, asking clarifying questions and building on past conversations to deliver personalised matches from across the web. Perplexity's approach centres on a more conversational approach, maintaining context if users decide to pivot to other needs after shopping related questions. Between 15% and 30% of online shoppers are expected to use generative AI to shop for holiday gifts this year, according to a survey from Bain, whilst Adobe predicted that AI-assisted online shopping will grow by 520% this holiday season. The advantage for OpenAI and Perplexity lies in their existing user bases and partnerships with major retailers: ChatGPT has integrated with Shopify, whilst Perplexity partnered with PayPal, allowing Perplexity users to complete purchases within the conversational interface rather than redirecting to external websites.
These integrated shopping capabilities position both companies to capture a meaningful share of the emerging AI-assisted shopping market during the critical holiday season. The fundamental difference in their approaches—ChatGPT's emphasis on focused research versus Perplexity's focus on smooth discovery and a more general built-in checkout system—reflects competing visions for how AI should assist shoppers. Their established user bases and partnerships with major payment providers give them a significant advantage over AI shopping startups such as Phia, Cherry, and Onton, which typically redirect customers to retailers' websites and rely on affiliate revenue.
Sources:
1. https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/25/openai-and-perplexity-are-launching-ai-shopping-assistants-but-competing-startups-arent-sweating-it/
2. https://openai.com/index/chatgpt-shopping-research/
3. https://www.engadget.com/ai/perplexity-announces-its-own-take-on-an-ai-shopping-assistant-210500961.html
4. https://fortune.com/2025/11/27/ai-shopping-apps-chatgpt-perplexity-amazon-walmart-google/
5. https://searchengineland.com/chatgpt-perplexity-ai-shopping-465196
