Perplexity, the AI-powered search and chat platform, has significantly upgraded its shopping features just in time for the peak holiday shopping season. The new tools, available to all users at no cost, aim to move beyond traditional, overwhelming product listings and create a more intuitive, conversational shopping experience.
Conversational Shopping and Personalization
The core change is a shift towards natural language interaction. Instead of sifting through endless pages of products, users can now discuss their needs with the AI. Perplexity will guide them to refine their search, asking clarifying questions to pinpoint the ideal item.
Importantly, the system remembers past conversations. This allows Perplexity to offer increasingly personalized recommendations, learning from previous preferences and searches. The company frames this as a solution to the “joyless” experience of endless scrolling through generic product grids.
Intelligent Product Cards and Streamlined Checkout
The revamped shopping experience also features enhanced “intelligent product cards.” These cards distill key information—pricing, specs, and reviews—into easily digestible formats. This is designed to cut through noise and surface the best options faster.
Perplexity is also leveraging its earlier partnership with PayPal to simplify checkout. The integration promises a more seamless transition from discovery to purchase.
The Rise of AI-Powered Shopping
This move underscores a growing trend: consumers are turning to AI chatbots for shopping assistance. Companies like Perplexity, Google (with Gemini), and OpenAI (with ChatGPT) are rapidly expanding their platforms to meet this demand. Features now include automated price tracking (Gemini buying when a target is hit) and agentic browsing capabilities (Perplexity Comet filling shopping carts autonomously).
This is happening because AI tools can now not only find products but also handle much of the decision-making and purchasing process for users. The integration of AI into e-commerce is no longer a future possibility; it’s unfolding in real-time, especially as Black Friday approaches.
The shift reflects a broader trend of AI platforms evolving beyond information retrieval to become active shopping assistants, blurring the lines between search, recommendation, and transaction.
