Shopify has opened its merchants’ checkouts to a visitor that fashion sites seldom see. Since 28 September, an agent in the buyer’s browser can fill in an eligible checkout and place the order once the buyer agrees, handing control back when the bank demands 3D Secure. Shopify’s developer changelog says the tools do not “require merchant configuration”. The platforms are writing the rules for this visitor, and merchants were asked to do nothing.

Fashion’s own figures suggest why few will look closely. At Zalando’s Partner Day in Berlin, About You managing director Tarek Müller told brand partners that chatbots such as ChatGPT and Claude send less than 0.5% of traffic to online fashion stores, WWD reports. WWD gives no period or method, and the figure counts chatbot referrals, not the browser agents Shopify’s tools serve. Whether thin referral traffic means thin agent traffic is an inference, not a finding. Google and Meta, Müller said, remain the main sources. Agents, he argued, suit “a job to get done”, and “in fashion, the majority of money is not spent like this.” He predicts they will improve within five years or so.

The week has been read as a contest of open against shut. TechCrunch set the launch beside retailers that block agents: Amazon, which has shut out Meta’s Muse, and Adidas, apparently, after one shopper’s post on X. Shopify staff product manager Gil Greenberg says the tools are designed to ensure “required disclosures” and “handoff requirements” under the Universal Commerce Protocol, which Google introduced as an open standard. Muse and Instinct, meanwhile, hold direct partnerships with Shopify. Open or shut, agents that want through must register keys with Shopify, and the favoured ones have already called on it.

Shopify’s developer documentation settles whose wallet pays. The tools accept no new card details, so the only payment an agent can select is a saved Shop Pay card, Shopify’s own wallet. The buyer chooses any other method on the checkout page. Merchants can add a review step or exclude checkouts, but nothing requires them to. Agents are told to sign their requests with registered keys, or bot detection “might deprioritize or block” them. The rules are sensible. They are also Shopify’s.

In India, Google is testing a Buy button on select Flipkart listings in Gemini and AI Mode, TechCrunch reports, citing people familiar with the matter. Google did not confirm the test and said only that it is always testing new features. One of those people said a wider rollout is planned for later in October, ahead of India’s festive shopping season. The button opens a Flipkart-branded checkout rather than the Google-hosted one shown earlier this year, and what technology powers it is unclear. The test covers smartphones, electronics and mobile accessories, which makes Müller’s point for him. Google, it should be said, took a minority stake in Flipkart for about $350 million in 2024.

Terms are never so easily set as when nobody thinks them worth reading.

Amazon, at least, says it wants to be asked. Explaining the block on Muse, a spokesperson said in an emailed statement that agents should “respect service provider decisions about whether or not to participate”. Opt-in, the statement added, is standard practice for food delivery apps and online travel agencies. Bloomberg notes that Amazon’s terms of use prohibit third-party shopping tools, that it sued Perplexity last year over a similar dispute, and that it builds shopping tools of its own. If Müller’s estimate holds, the agents will have five years to improve and the terms a five-year head start.