Visa, OpenAI Team Up to Bring AI-Powered Shopping to ChatGPT
In Focus
- Visa and OpenAI want to make agentic commerce more reliable and accessible
- Visa will embed its payment technology into OpenAI experiences
- Agentic tools will complete purchases through Visa-enabled networks
Visa is partnering with OpenAI to make agentic commerce more reliable, accessible, and secure for customers and businesses globally. Under the partnership, Visa will integrate its global payments network and security technology into OpenAI’s products and services, including ChatGPT.
“AI will transform commerce more profoundly than the internet or mobile technology ever did. As AI agents become active participants in the economy, Visa’s aim is to ensure transactions are trusted, secure, and seamless. That’s the infrastructure we’re building with partners like OpenAI,” Chief Product and Strategy Officer at Visa, Jack Forestell said in a statement.
How Will the Visa Payment System in ChatGPT Work?
Visa will embed its payment technology into OpenAI experiences. This will enable developers and merchants to accept payments made by AI agents on behalf of users with ease. Visa will also provide the underlying payment infrastructure, including its tokenization technology, transaction authorization systems, agent verification tools, and fraud detection capabilities.
These features are expected to secure AI-initiated transactions while ensuring their reliability and trustworthiness. The integration of Visa payment network into ChatGPT will also allow AI agents to recommend products to chatbot users and complete purchases.
Agentic tools will interpret user requests, compare merchant catalogs, and complete purchases through Visa-enabled networks. Previously, retail AI integrations restricted payment networks to single retailers or selected groups of approved merchants.
Visa’s approach moves beyond this closed-loop model and works across multiple merchants and open web catalogues. This means users can request an item, and AI models will handle discovery, selection, and payment end-to-end.
Which Shopping Tools Has OpenAI Introduced Before?
OpenAI had also tested e-commerce features, including “Instant Checkout,” which let ChatGPT act as a shopping assistant to find products online. However, it suffered from reliability issues and low merchant adoption due to fees, and was eventually discontinued in March.
OpenAI also added a tool called “Shopping Research” to ChatGPT last year. The tool allowed users to to find items by describing what they want. The Visa-powered ChatGPT purchase feature varies from the two tools in the sense that users can link their payment cards to the AI chatbot to shop.
OpenAI will provide the technology to support agentic interactions. The technology will allow AI agents to make decisions and take purchase actions on ChatGPT.
“We’re building the infrastructure for secure, transparent, and user-controlled agentic transactions, helping people do more with AI agents while maintaining confidence that payments are being handled securely,” OpenAI’s Head of Partnerships, Marco Mahrus, noted.
What the Partnership With Visa Means for OpenAI
For OpenAI, the partnership with Visa represents an important step towards moving ChatGPT from an information tool into a transaction platform. This expands ChatGPT’s role in commerce and creates a new channel for buyers to interact with sellers. It also reduces dependence on conventional websites, ads, and email marketing.
While the partnership will likely enhance user engagement and unlock new revenue opportunities for OpenAI, it also raises concerns around consumer trust as AI begins executing purchases directly.
