Walmart is introducing a framework for AI agents to shop on customers’ behalf, with Agent Profiles, the Walmart Agent Gateway and new terms for AI agents giving customers clear permissions, controls and protections as they shop Walmart and Sam’s Club through the apps and agents they choose.
The retailer already serves customers through conversational commerce integrations with its own Sparky assistant as well as ChatGPT, Gemini and others. “Shopping with an agent won’t be for everyone, and it doesn’t have to be,” the Bentonville, Arkansas-based company said in announcing the tools. “But for customers who choose to use one, our goal is to make our experience the most trusted by building clear controls and protections into the experience from the start.”
Agent Profiles
Launching in the next month, Agent Profiles let customers authorize each AI agent with a dedicated profile within their account, separating the agent’s purchases from their own. Customers can require approval for every purchase or set a spending limit, $50, $100 or $200, for example, within which the agent can buy on its own, and can delete an agent’s profile at any time. Walmart compares the model to adding an authorized cardholder on a credit card: a way to pay, a spending limit and visibility into how it’s used.
Pricing stays flat across channels: “We price products, not people, so the prices that an AI agent sees are the same prices that a human would see on Walmart.com, with applicable offers and fees shown before purchase,” the company said.
The Agent Gateway
Today, agents shop Walmart’s site through a web browser built for people, which can be slow and error-prone. The Walmart Agent Gateway will give agents a faster, more reliable path using Model Context Protocol, beginning with a beta for companies and developers. The gateway also will help agents shop a customer’s “usuals,” their regular bread or milk brand, for example, without sharing the customer’s broader purchase history with the agent.
Terms for agents
Walmart’s new terms establish what agents can and cannot do, including:
- Customers must approve agent purchases by default, and Walmart may require additional approvals even within spending limits.
- Agents must not take actions beyond what the shopper intends and can access only the information needed for the task and allowed by the customer.
- Agents don’t receive customers’ payment card information and can’t add or change payment methods.
- Walmart’s returns process applies, including when an agent doesn’t act as intended, and agents that violate the terms will be blocked from Walmart’s site.