Most agent shopping news is about one side: either the assistant that sends shoppers to stores, or the store that wants to be found. Microsoft's January 2026 announcement covered both at once. Copilot Checkout puts the purchase inside Microsoft's assistant. Brand Agents put an AI shopping assistant on the store's own website.
In this article, we look at what Microsoft announced, what each half asks of a store, and the decisions it leaves to you, including one that some stores face by default.
What Microsoft announced
On January 8, 2026, Microsoft Advertising introduced two products:
- Copilot Checkout. A shopper can go from a question to a purchase inside Copilot, with no redirect to the store's site. Microsoft says the store stays the merchant of record and owns the transaction, the customer data and the relationship.
- Brand Agents. AI shopping assistants that speak in a brand's voice on the brand's own website and guide visitors toward a purchase.
At launch, Copilot Checkout began rolling out in the US on Copilot.com, with PayPal, Shopify and Stripe as partners. Microsoft said it would expand across the Copilot ecosystem, naming Bing, MSN and Edge. It also mentioned working with Mastercard Agent Pay and Visa Intelligent Commerce.
Microsoft published its own data with the launch: journeys that include Copilot led to 53% more purchases within 30 minutes than journeys without it, and when shopping intent was present, journeys with Copilot were 194% more likely to end in a purchase. These are the company's own figures, not an independent measurement.
How stores join
The route depends on the platform:
- Shopify. Microsoft says Shopify merchants are enrolled automatically after an opt-out window, with no application and no integration. Shopify's own March 2026 announcement said thousands of merchants were already selling in Microsoft Copilot through its Agentic Storefronts.
- PayPal or Stripe. Merchants apply through a form Microsoft published.
- Others. No route was described in the announcement. For now, a store outside these partners reaches Copilot shoppers the way it reaches any assistant: through pages that Bing and Copilot can read.
Decision 1: in or out
For Shopify stores, the default is in. That isn't a bad default, but it should be a decision rather than an accident. Before the opt-out window closes, or now if it already has, check:
- Which products are eligible, and whether any should be excluded, such as items with complex sizing or long lead times.
- Which customer details reach you with each Copilot order, and whether you can contact the customer directly. We listed the questions in merchant of record and the customer relationship.
- How Copilot orders are marked in your admin, so you can measure them separately.
Decision 2: what Copilot sees
When checkout happens inside the assistant, your product data is your storefront. There is no product page to persuade, no size guide to scroll and no banner to read. Copilot works with what your catalog and pages say.
- Titles and variants that make sense without a photo. "Option 2" doesn't help anyone.
- Prices and stock that are current, because the shopper will pay the price the assistant shows.
- Delivery and return terms in numbers. The shopper will ask, and the assistant can only repeat what it can read. See stock and delivery promises an agent can check.
For stores outside the partner routes, the same data on your own pages is what Bing and Copilot read. Our guide to machine-readable product pages is the starting point.
Decision 3: an assistant on your own site
Brand Agents are the other half: an AI assistant that answers shoppers on your website. Microsoft cites one retailer with over three times higher conversion in assisted sessions, but that is a single example chosen by the vendor, and an assisted session is not a random one.
If you add any AI assistant to your site, Microsoft's or another, three things are worth deciding up front:
- What it may say. An assistant that invents a delivery date or a return term creates a promise you have to keep. Feed it your actual policies and product data, and test it with hard questions.
- That it says it is AI. In the EU, the AI Act's transparency rules have applied since August 2, 2026, and an assistant that talks to shoppers is the kind of system they cover. We look at what that means for stores in the next post.
- Where the data goes. Check what the vendor stores from conversations and for how long.
Questions to test an assistant with
Before an AI assistant answers your customers, or before you rely on one that sells your products elsewhere, ask it what customers actually ask:
- "Will this arrive in Ankara by Friday if I order today?"
- "Can I return this if it was on sale?"
- "I'm between two sizes. Which should I take?"
- "Is the blue one in size M in stock?"
- "What's the total with shipping?"
- "How is this different from the cheaper model?"
Write down every answer that isn't in your published data. Each one is either a gap in your data or something the assistant made up, and both need fixing.
The bottom line
Microsoft's announcement shows both directions agent shopping is taking: purchases moving into the assistant, and assistants moving onto store websites. For Shopify stores in the US, the first is a default to review. For everyone, the second is a choice. Either way, the work underneath is the same: product data that is correct without a page around it, and terms an agent can repeat without inventing anything.
Specoria checks whether your product, price, delivery and return data are readable and consistent, so that an assistant, yours or someone else's, can repeat them correctly. Start with a free readiness test.
Sources
- Microsoft Advertising, Conversations that Convert: Copilot Checkout and Brand Agents, January 8, 2026.
- Shopify, Millions of merchants can sell in AI chats, March 24, 2026.
- European Commission, Transparency obligations under Article 50 of the AI Act, last updated July 24, 2026.