Shopify says AI search is sending more shoppers to its stores

In short: Shopify says people using AI search are bringing more traffic and sales to Shopify stores, while Google-style search is still growing.

What's going on

Shopify said on its second-quarter earnings call that AI search is acting as a helper to traditional search, not a replacement. Shopify President Harley Finkelstein told analysts that search engines like Google remain one of the company’s biggest sources of shopper visits, and that this traffic is still increasing.

Shopify also said AI-driven traffic and orders to Shopify stores tripled compared with the same quarter a year earlier. The company reported revenue of $3.6 billion for the quarter, up 36% year over year, which was higher than Wall Street expectations.

Finkelstein explained why AI search can work differently from keyword search. He said an AI assistant can consider several needs at once, like size and fit, instead of mostly matching a few words. He compared it to asking for “the best car seat that fits three across a sedan,” where a normal search might focus on the words “car seat,” but an AI tool tries to match the full situation.

Shopify said these AI-referred visits more often land directly on a product page. It also said 75% of AI-attributed purchases happened outside Shopify’s top 100 product categories, suggesting smaller and less popular items may be getting more attention.

What to watch

Shopify is building connections to AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity, which could make it easier for AI assistants to browse Shopify product listings and send shoppers to checkout. A key question is whether other online stores will see the same lift, or if the benefits will concentrate on platforms that control product data and payments.

Source: TechCrunch AI