OpenAI Instant Checkout was announced in late 2025, but this month the company shared it was scaling back the project while focusing on merchant sites or integrated services.
In September of 2025, OpenAI said it was “taking the first steps toward ChatGPT helping people buy,” powered by the Agentic Commerce Protocol. The tech was open-sourced to help speed adoption.
Agentic commerce is when AI not only helps you find what to buy but also helps you buy it.
Chris Jones, Managing Director at PSE Consulting, says the pause on agentic commerce is not a failure but simply reflects the enormous challenge of integrating AI agents in online shopping as these systems must “navigate a vast and complex landscape including product data, identity, fraud, tax, liability, loyalty and payments across thousands of merchants.”
Jones pointed to a report identifying five constraints beyond a company’s control:
“protocol fragmentation, product data not designed for machine consumption, legacy enterprise stacks, trust and liability frameworks, and onboarding at scale.” He said that together, this means what works in demos can break quickly in production environments.
“From a payments perspective, some challenges remain addressable. Fraud, tax, and payment flows can be improved through collaboration across payment networks, infrastructure providers, and AI platforms. These are areas where scale, standards, and partnerships can drive progress over time,” explains Jones. “Other issues will evolve more slowly. SKU accuracy, real time product availability and the structural complexity of enterprise commerce stacks are deeply embedded in how ecommerce works today. Resolving these requires coordination across merchants, platforms and infrastructure providers.”
He added that merchants are cautious because the platforms are not ready yet.
“For payments specialists, the takeaway is clear. Agentic commerce success requires a holistic approach. Solving payments in isolation is not enough. Systems must handle multiple protocols, maintain accurate product data, support persistent identity, manage liability and scale onboarding. The recent developments from ChatGPT and the insights from Adyen should not be seen as a retreat, but as a reminder that the industry is still building the infrastructure needed to make autonomous shopping safe, reliable and seamless.”
