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It was only a matter of time before Mark Zuckerberg's Meta jumped into the AI shopping race. According to a Bloomberg report, Meta is testing a new AI shopping assistant feature to compete with OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Gemini in one of the fastest-growing areas of e-commerce.
A representative for Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Meta joins an AI shopping assistant market that is expected to boom. Research and consulting firm Grand View Research projects the market to grow from $3.36 billion in 2024 to $28.54 billion by 2033 -- an annual rate of nearly 27%. North America currently controls 40% of the worldwide market.
Other AI shopping assistants aside from ChatGPT, Gemini and now Meta are also available. They include Amazon's Rufus (ZDNet loves it), Amazon's Interests, Klarna (by OpenAI), Shopify and even eBay.
Initially, only some US-based Meta AI users will see the new feature within the chatbot, according to Bloomberg.
Say you ask the chatbot about the most popular cat toys. The AI will return a horizontal carousel of products, along with price, brand information, and websites where you can buy them.
The AI tool will also offer a short explanation of why it is recommending each product. You won't be able to directly purchase from the Meta AI site, however. You will need to visit the merchant's external link.
On Meta's AI browser, some US-based users can ask the chatbot for shopping suggestions.
MetaVice President and Principal Analyst Sucharita Kodali of research firm Forrester said Meta's test looks like "a copycat move" and an attempt to get in on the AI shopping hype.
"When you look at data that ChatGPT and Perplexity have shared, shopping use cases are still very limited, so I'm not sure there is a huge opportunity or need here," Kodali told CNET. "Nor is it clear what Meta would bring to merchants or consumers that is better than anything Instagram already does."
OpenAI's ChatGPT already has an AI shopping research feature. I tried it and asked, "Please show me the best cat toys to buy." The AI responded with a curated list of highly rated cat toys. It offered a horizontal, scrollable carousel of products; each product displayed its price at different stores. As with Meta, you have to click on the store's website link for each product to buy it.
OpenAI's ChatGPT also has an AI shopping research tool.
OpenAIWith Google's Gemini AI shopping assistant, I asked the same question: "Please show me the best cat toys to buy." Gemini responded with products, images, prices, descriptions and links to stores -- basically the same setup as Meta and ChatGPT.
Meta's entrance into the AI shopping market reflects a broader shift in how consumers engage with products online, as AI reshapes e-commerce experiences and businesses seek deeper integration between social, search and purchase journeys.
Traditionally, online shopping began with keyword searches on e-commerce sites or search engines, but AI now enables more natural language, personalized discovery and tailored suggestions based on context, intent and user data.
Brad Jashinsky, director analyst at research firm Gartner, said customer trust is an issue with AI shopping assistants.
"Our recent survey found that nearly two-thirds of consumers think GenAI-powered shopping tools, whether provided by retailers or by GenAI platforms, will make biased shopping recommendations," Jashinsky told CNET. "Customer behavior takes a long time to change. It wasn't until 2023 that more e-commerce shopping was done on mobile devices versus desktop devices in the US. That was 16 years after the iPhone debuted."
Jashinsky said companies have been slow to adopt agentic AI and GenAI for online shopping experiences.
"More than half of customer experience leaders fear that AI delivering inaccurate responses or content threatens the customer experience," he said.
