Q3 2024 earnings from Google and Amazon reveal accelerating consumer adoption of agentic commerce. McKinsey's survey of approximately 21,000 consumers across 11 markets in June found that 53% of adults had used AI for at least one shopping task in the previous three months, with usage varying by region. Among AI users, 50% relied on stand-alone AI platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini, compared to only 29% who used a retailer's own assistant. Proprietary research showed that when shoppers used AI to narrow product choices, 84% of the time they purchased one of the products recommended by the AI agent.
Google's earnings revealed a critical shift in shopper behavior: while search queries grew at their fastest rate in five years, Search and other revenue growth decelerated to 12% in Q3 from 17% in Q2, falling below Wall Street expectations. Google's chief business officer attributed the slowdown to AI Mode queries growing rapidly but monetizing at lower rates than traditional search. Meanwhile, Amazon reported that Alexa for Shopping (formerly Rufus) reached 400M+ users, with interactions up 570% year-over-year, and customers who used the shopping agent spent 50% more per order than those who did not. However, Amazon's ad revenue growth simultaneously slowed, mirroring Google's pattern of agentic commerce adoption cannibalizing traditional monetization channels.
The data suggests that Q3 marked a tipping point where discovery—the research and product-finding phases of shopping—has shifted from retailer-controlled channels to AI agents. For commerce practitioners and brands, the implication is stark: before a shopper ever visits a merchant's site, an AI agent may have already explained product differences and narrowed the field. This forces brands to compete on product data quality and visibility within third-party AI surfaces, not just on their own digital properties. Purchase completion and checkout integration will follow, but discovery has already begun its migration to agentic platforms.