Shopify reported in August 2026 that AI-driven traffic and orders to its merchants’ stores tripled year over year in the second quarter, with the company crediting AI search as a key contributor to a strong earnings beat.
Shopify President Harley Finkelstein described AI as “a complement to search, rather than a substitute for it” during the company’s Q2 earnings call. He noted that traditional search sessions have grown 1.3x over the past two years and still account for roughly a third of all storefront sessions, suggesting AI search is adding volume rather than cannibalizing existing traffic.
Finkelstein explained why AI search appears to convert more effectively for merchants: “While search engines rank by popularity against a handful of keywords, AI agents make multiple calls into Shopify’s catalog, working with richer structured data to match products with the buyer’s specific intent.” He illustrated this with an example of a buyer searching for a car seat that fits three across a sedan — a query where an AI agent can simultaneously process dimensions, vehicle type, and quantity, rather than matching on keywords alone.
The company said half of all AI-referred sessions land directly on a product description page, which is 2.5 times the rate seen with traditional search. Additionally, 75% of AI-attributed purchases in Q2 occurred outside Shopify’s top 100 categories, a segment the company described as its “sweet spot.”
Shopify posted revenue of $3.6 billion for the quarter, up 36% year over year and ahead of Wall Street’s forecast of $3.4 billion. Gross operating profit rose 31% to $1.71 billion, also above analyst expectations of $1.63 billion.
The results stand in contrast to the impact AI has had on online publishing, where AI-generated summaries have reduced click-through rates and cut into advertising revenue. Shopify’s experience suggests the effect of AI search may vary significantly depending on the nature of the business and how products are structured in catalogs.
Shopify also noted it has built connectors to AI platforms including Claude, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Manus, Replit, and Vercel, as well as development platforms such as Lovable.
Source: TechCrunch