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ZDNET’s key takeaways
- Perplexity is refreshing its AI shopping agent for the holidays.
- It’ll be free for US-based users on web and desktop.
- It’s part of Perplexity’s vision of a more personalized internet.
We’re just a little more than one week away from Black Friday, the unofficial start of the annual nationwide holiday shopping spree. AI startup Perplexity is gearing up by launching its AI-powered shopping agent to a wider audience.
Also: I let Google’s new AI tools take on my holiday shopping list – here’s how it went
Originally debuted this time last year, Perplexity’s shopping agent is intended to serve as a kind of virtual assistant that saves users time by surfacing personalized product recommendations and minimizing the steps between discovery and checkout. Starting next week, the agent will be available to all US users for free with some enhanced personalization features, according to Perplexity.
How it works (and what’s new)
Users can start by querying either Perplexity’s desktop app or website. Perplexity will then “detect if your question has shopping intent, and integrate product recommendations directly into that answer,” the company explained in its announcement.
Like all Perplexity products, the shopping assistant is built atop a large language model, allowing it to interact with users via natural language text. Its newly upgraded agent architecture now enables it to retrieve “memories” from past conversations with a particular user, search through websites to retrieve relevant product information, complete purchases, and perform other tasks integral to the online shopping experience.
Also: How small businesses can survive AI shopping: 7 essential steps
Say you’re shopping for a new acoustic guitar. Rather than feeding a vague search query like “affordable new guitars” into a search engine and having to parse through a virtually limitless list of web links, the idea behind Perplexity’s new shopping agent is that it actively helps you to figure out exactly what you’re looking for, while you look for it.
You might tell the agent: “Help me find an inexpensive but high-quality acoustic guitar that’s well-suited to an adult beginner.” From there, it’ll prompt you with some follow-up questions to help refine your search. Instead of presenting you with a long grid of similar-looking items, the agent responds with what Perplexity calls “product cards,” which include an image, the price, and an AI-generated product description.
The assistant’s “Buy With Pro” feature, which lets users buy items with a single click, was previously reserved for Perplexity Pro users – a $20 per month subscription – but is now available to everyone for free.
Building off its existing partnership with PayPal, Perplexity’s shopping agent can also now complete purchases right from a product card through an integrated link with the online payment service.
How to try it
The new agentic shopping experience is slated to launch next week and will be free for all US-based Perplexity users, according to the company. It’s initially only available through Perplexity’s website and desktop app, but will be accessible via the company’s iOS app and Comet browser in the coming weeks, according to the announcement.
AI is changing shopping
The news of the upcoming launch arrives at a time when many leading tech companies have been investing heavily in so-called agents, AI systems that go beyond the capabilities of traditional chatbots by autonomously handling complex tasks involving multiple steps with little to no human oversight. Agents can also leverage separate digital tools, including web browsers and other AI agents.
Also: I let ChatGPT Atlas do my Walmart shopping for me – here’s how the AI browser agent did
Specifically and especially during holiday season, AI companies are launching tools for agentic shopping. For example, OpenAI’s browser, Atlas, includes an Agent Mode that lets ChatGPT shop for you.
Some AI developers have focused on delivering agents to businesses, driven by the notions that such tools can boost employee productivity and increase profit, both of which have yet to be definitively proven.
Perplexity, meanwhile, has set its sights more on building agents for individual users. The company positions itself as the vanguard of a new and more democratic internet, one that stands in sharp contrast to the current online ecosystem, which is governed by the dictates of advertising and the interests of legacy tech giants. It recently launched an agent to help users manage their email, for example, and it’s positioned Comet as the cornerstone for a new, more interactive and collaborative (between humans and AI) kind of web browsing.
Also: Why Amazon really doesn’t want Perplexity’s AI browser shopping for you
One of those legacy tech giants has begun to push back, however. Earlier this month, Amazon threatened legal action against Perplexity, claiming that by surreptitiously deploying Comet to shop on behalf of users on Amazon’s online store, Perplexity “has already caused considerable harm, including disrupting Amazon’s customer relationships and forcing Amazon to devote significant resources to track, investigate, and address Perplexity’s misconduct.”
Perplexity brushed off the claim, calling it “bullying” and “a threat to all internet users.
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