Walmart said Wednesday it is introducing new tools that will allow artificial intelligence agents to shop and complete transactions on behalf of customers.
According to a report by The Verge, the retailer has established a set of rules for AI agents, requiring that they “must not take actions beyond what the shopper intends” and prohibiting them from changing a customer’s payment method. Agents will also be allowed to access only the information necessary to complete a task. Walmart said it will block agents that fail to follow these rules.
The agents will connect to new “Agent Profiles” within Walmart’s platform. By default, the retailer will require customers to approve all purchases made by AI agents, but users can also authorize agents to shop within a specified budget. Customers will be able to review purchases made by their agents separately from their own activity and deactivate an agent at any time.
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Walmart has developed an “Agent Gateway,” currently available in beta, that connects AI agents through the Model Context Protocol (MCP), an open standard that allows AI systems to connect with external services and tools.
According to Walmart, the system is designed to let AI agents shop seamlessly while limiting their access to customers’ shopping histories and personal information.
“For example, if a customer tends to buy sourdough bread or a particular brand of milk, Walmart will help the agent find those usual items for the customer without sharing the customer’s broader shopping history with the agent,” the company said.
Walmart plans to extend the AI shopping tools to Sam’s Club as well.
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The move signals a different approach from Amazon, which has taken steps to block third-party AI shopping agents, including Perplexity’s shopping agent and Meta’s Muse AI assistant.
Last month, Amazon said it had blocked Meta’s Muse personal AI agent from shopping on Amazon.com on behalf of customers. Amazon said it had unsuccessfully asked Meta to exclude its e-commerce platform from the service, adding that Meta had not obtained permission for Muse to access the site and that the agent did not identify itself while browsing.
Earlier this year, a federal judge temporarily barred startup Perplexity from accessing Amazon’s website through its Comet AI browser, according to court filings. Amazon sued Perplexity in November 2025, alleging that the startup took steps to “conceal” its AI agents so they could continue accessing the retailer’s website without authorization.