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Google expanded AI Mode’s shopping capabilities to a larger share of its US user base this week 1, enabling product search, comparison, and purchase facilitation directly within the AI-powered search interface. AI Mode surfaces structured product listings, price comparisons across retailers, and availability data, connecting to checkout via Google Pay for participating merchants.
The expansion follows the Universal Commerce Protocol launch in January 2026 2; AI Mode’s merchant integration draws on UCP-structured product data where available and falls back to Google’s existing merchant feed for non-UCP participants. Google characterised the expansion as moving AI Mode shopping from limited testing to general availability for US users.
Google AI Mode joins ChatGPT shopping research 3, Amazon Rufus 4, and Perplexity’s buy feature 5 as the fourth major AI interface to deploy commerce functionality. Google’s connection to its existing merchant feed infrastructure distinguishes the expansion from the others — it draws on an existing dataset of structured product listings rather than a new agent-optimised feed built from scratch.
This is the first AEO-lane event since OpenAI’s ChatGPT shopping expansion in November 2025 3, a gap of eleven weeks. Four of seven tracked lanes have been active in the six weeks since the start of 2026.
Google enables Direct Offers, Business Agent chat, and sponsored formats inside AI Mode Search; Etsy and Wayfair items become purchasable inside Gemini without leaving Google.
Bloomberg