What Agentic Commerce Means for Retail
Agentic commerce platforms are systems where AI shopping assistants act as autonomous agents that guide customers from discovery to purchase, using retailer data to personalize interactions and complete tasks without human intervention. In practice, these retail AI agents run inside websites, mobile apps, and commerce backends, handling questions, suggestions, and even transactions. Their goal is to turn browsing into an autonomous commerce experience that feels like a conversation with a well-trained sales associate. Instead of static menus and filters, shoppers describe their needs in natural language and the agent curates options, explains trade-offs, and adapts in real time. For retailers, the same agent can connect to inventory, pricing, and content systems to keep recommendations accurate and context aware. This shift signals a move from isolated chatbots to end‑to‑end, task-completing AI shopping infrastructure.
Amazon Turns its AI Shopping Assistant into a Platform
Amazon’s cloud division is pushing agentic commerce into the mainstream by offering the AWS Agentic Shopping Assistant to outside retailers. Built on the technology behind Alexa for Shopping on Amazon.com, the assistant lets merchants embed an AI shopping assistant directly into their own e-commerce sites. It can chat with shoppers, answer detailed product questions, and deliver recommendations shaped by each retailer’s inventory, brand rules, and catalog data. Amazon says retailers can deploy an assistant in about 60 days, transforming their online stores into agentic commerce platforms rather than static product grids. According to Accenture, more than 30% of online commerce could run through AI agents by 2030, representing about USD 3.1 trillion (approx. RM14.26 trillion) in transactions. Amazon’s move positions AWS as a core infrastructure provider for retail AI agents, even as retailers weigh the trade-offs of relying on a competitor’s cloud.
Nosto and Shopify Sidekick Bring Agentic Workflows Inside the Back Office
While Amazon focuses on shopper-facing agents, Nosto and Shopify Sidekick are building agentic workflows for the teams behind the scenes. Nosto, an agentic commerce experience platform, now plugs directly into Shopify’s AI assistant so merchandisers can refine product discovery and personalization through conversational prompts. During a live demo for Ford’s online accessories store, a team member used Sidekick prompts to change the design of Nosto-powered recommendations without leaving Shopify or calling developers. This makes Shopify stores feel like agentic commerce platforms from the inside: human staff describe the outcome they want, and an AI agent updates layouts, logic, and experiences. Nosto’s Huginn agent and Huginn Connect extend this further, with plans for a Doc Agent, Merchandising Agent, and performance reporting surfaced through Sidekick. The result is a more autonomous commerce experience that spans both shopper journeys and internal workflows.
DICK'S Sporting Goods Uses AI Coach to Personalize Journeys
DICK’S Sporting Goods is taking agentic commerce into its mobile app with Coach by DICK’S, a conversational AI assistant designed for athletes and active consumers. The AI coach combines the retailer’s product knowledge with conversational AI to give real-time guidance, product recommendations, and training content. Shoppers can describe their sport, skill level, and preferences, and the assistant responds with tailored gear suggestions, “Pro Tips,” and equipment education, all linked to the catalog and services DICK’S provides. This moves conversational AI beyond support tickets into rich shopping guidance that feels like a personal coach inside the app. It also fits into DICK’S wider AI strategy, which includes AI-driven inventory management and RFID automation pilots. By tying retail AI agents to inventory systems and customer profiles, the company is building an autonomous commerce experience where digital coaching, product availability, and personalized journeys are tightly connected.
The Next Phase of Agentic Commerce Platforms
Together, Amazon, Nosto with Shopify, and DICK’S Sporting Goods show how agentic commerce platforms are becoming the new layer of retail infrastructure. Shopper-facing AI shopping assistants handle discovery, questions, and suggestions, while back-office agents manage merchandising, configuration, and optimization. The through line is autonomy: these retail AI agents are designed to complete multi-step tasks with minimal human intervention, from curating outfits to revising recommendation layouts. This reflects a broader enterprise move toward AI agents that operate across systems rather than isolated chat interfaces. The competitive stakes are clear as major platforms race to own the agentic layer: cloud providers want to power it, commerce platforms want to embed it, and retailers want to differentiate through it. As agents gain access to more operational data, the challenge will be balancing automation with trust, control, and brand voice across every autonomous commerce experience.