Walmart is opening checkout to AI shopping agents, with limits you set, while Amazon keeps outside bots off its site. Here is how the limits work.
Walmart plans to let AI assistants place orders on your account, but only inside a spending limit you choose. Amazon is doing the opposite and blocking outside AI shoppers. Walmart announced the plan on October 21. It is called the Walmart Agent Gateway, and full rollout is targeted for late November, just before the busiest shopping weeks.
Each approved AI agent gets its own Agent Profile inside your Walmart account. It is separate from your own login. Reporting from TechCrunch and Axios says agents never see your card details and cannot add or change a payment method.
You then pick one of two modes.
Walmart says it can still ask for extra approval inside the ceiling if something looks off.
The Gateway runs on Anthropic's open Model Context Protocol, a standard that lets AI tools connect to outside systems without custom work for each pairing. Requests go through Sparky, Walmart's own shopping assistant, instead of an agent clicking around the website like a person.
For now it is an invite-only beta. Walmart says it is working with OpenAI and Google so ChatGPT and Gemini can show Walmart products and walk a shopper through checkout without leaving the chat.
Amazon has blocked a growing list of AI shopping agents from buying on its site, including Meta's Muse, according to Axios. It also fought Perplexity over its Comet browser agent. Amazon won a federal injunction in March, but the Ninth Circuit vacated it on August 4. Amazon's own answer is Rufus, a shopping assistant it controls from start to finish.
The two companies are making different bets. Walmart is gaining reach through ChatGPT and Gemini, which already have huge audiences, and accepting less control over the shopping experience. Amazon wants to own the whole path from search to payment.
If you try AI shopping this holiday season, start with a low cap or approve each purchase yourself. That way a mistaken order stays small. Because the beta is invite-only, many shoppers may not see the feature right away.
If you let an AI agent shop for you, set a low spending cap or approve each purchase yourself so a mistake cannot get expensive.
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