RESEARCH REPORT
Agentic commerce: Make your brand unmissable
Staying visible, chosen and trusted as agents reshape commerce and customer relationships.
10-MINUTE READ
April 28, 2026
In brief
- Agentic commerce isn’t just another channel or type of influencer, it’s a generational reset of who—and what—selects and buys products.
- Brands now have two audiences in commerce: the person and the agent acting on that person’s behalf.
- Brands that optimize their offerings for people and AI agents will grow; those that don’t risk becoming invisible to agents.
A new kind of change-agent
Digital commerce never lived up to its promise. Yes, it increased choice and made buying easier. But consumers got overwhelmed by options and information, and now often struggle to make decisions. Brands are absorbing the cost in abandoned carts, high return rates, eroding margins and non-stop spending to reacquire the same customers.
Agentic commerce flips that model. AI agents can now compare products, read the fine print, choose a winner, complete a purchase and manage delivery and returns—all autonomously, on a customer's behalf. The long-held understanding of who makes buying decisions, and when, and how, is changing fast.
Changing behaviors: What the data show
90%
of frequent AI users in North America say they’d be open to switching away from a previously preferred brand if their AI assistant offered a better alternative.1
Up to 45%
of shoppers are expected to shift at least half of their commerce activities into agent-mediated ecosystems in the next two years.2
25%
of executives say that in three years, AI agents will be their number one audience for content, surpassing even search engines.3
Agents with agency
Two types of agents are driving digital commerce today. General-purpose “horizontal” agents work across all categories and industries, and increasingly integrate merchant-owned checkout and payment capabilities so a simple conversational query can turn into a completed transaction. “Vertical” agents are specialists, built to go deep rather than wide within a single category—think travel, beauty, investing—and draw on deep customer data to solve human problems and form lasting relationships with consumers. Both types of agents now sit between a brand and its customers, determining what products get chosen and purchased.
Two strategies for commerce
Nearly all companies will need to structure their offerings to be seen and chosen by AI agents—to be the choice of agents. This means optimizing product data so agents can understand features, compare warranties and return policies, and select and purchase a winner—in seconds—based on the needs of the customer.
Category leaders in each industry may also become an agent of choice—the agent that humans and other agents turn to for products and services. This requires extensive investment: deep domain expertise, first-party data, integrated services and partnerships, and the ability to bundle solutions and curate experiences from end to end. Brands that get it right become the agent in an agent-mediated market and are able to maintain direct relationships with their customers.
The new economics of agentic commerce
Agent-mediated transactions are projected to shift demand in the next two years and create net-new demand to drive P&L impact—not just in top-line growth but by reinventing the cost structures of digital commerce. Here are five areas that will drive economics in agent-mediated markets and allow companies to capitalize on the change that’s coming.
Agentic commerce reduces many of the hidden costs of digital commerce: abandoned carts, the need to reacquire customers, high return rates, restocking expenses, support calls caused by confusion. When agents reduce the cognitive burden on customers, clarify trade-offs upfront and establish persistent preference, those costs shrink.
Operations also get more efficient. Reliable inventory, accurate pricing, smooth payment authorization and fewer exceptions all help protect margins and generate predictable cash flow.
To meet demand at the individual household level and react at the speed of agents, supply chains must place inventory closer to the customer. Forecasting must evolve to recognize content-driven demand signals in real time and a range of fulfillment models—ship-from-store, micro-fulfillment, scheduled delivery, pickup, cross-docking—must be supported.
Automated workflows, real-time data and machine-driven decision-making are table stakes, with people on point to handle exceptions that machines can’t resolve.
With agentic commerce, the payment process is key to boosting conversions, reducing disputes, limiting exposure to fraud, reducing servicing costs and getting selected by agents.
Payment platforms also drive margin by making offers and incentives machine-readable, so agents can identify the best overall value and are prevented from taking advantage of loopholes or ineligible discounts or offers.
Agents never sleep, so they can dramatically change the speed and volume of transactions including replenishments, substitutions, refunds and services. Leading brands will build agent-ready, always-on decision systems that are automated by default and have humans handling governance and complex situations.
This requires tight coordination across functions and an agentic commerce “control tower” that keeps product, marketing, pricing, payments, supply chain, legal, security, and data and AI teams aligned. Success will be measured in tangible KPIs such as number of exceptions per thousand transactions, cost to serve, and how often agents choose—or bypass—the brand.
Investment in AI is accelerating, but for most companies, measurable gains have been slow to materialize. Our research reveals that an elite group of companies—"Talent Reinventors”—saw early returns on their AI investments with a human-AI talent strategy, and are on track to achieve 6% to 10% higher revenue and 5% higher profit than their peers by 2030.
By keeping humans in the lead, these organizations are delivering value by creating cultures where people and AI share work, support each other and evolve together. That’s why leading brands now treat talent strategy with the same urgency as payments, supply chain and operations strategy.
Real change is here
Agentic commerce is redefining the relationship between brands and customers. The implications ripple through every sector and industry, causing organizations to fundamentally reassess how they sell their products and services.
The stakes go beyond technology, customer experiences and loyalty programs. Agentic commerce reshapes the very cost structure of digital commerce. Brands that get it right will pull further ahead in their categories with every transaction. Those that don't risk becoming invisible—passed over in milliseconds by a machine that has no reason to choose them.
1Accenture Agentic Commerce consumer survey, September 2025
2Accenture Aaru Agentic Commerce Simulation, February 2026
3Accenture Tech Vision 2026 executive survey, January 2026
