OpenAI to take a commission from ChatGPT online shoppers

OpenAI is preparing on taking a percentage of sales when users buy products directly via ChatGPT using its built-in checkout feature, part of its effort to build out e-commerce tools and boost revenue.

The company already presents product suggestions in ChatGPT, with links that send users to outside retailers. In April, it teamed up with payments provider Shopify to explore deeper shopping integrations.

Financial Times reported that OpenAI now intends to add a built‑in checkout feature so purchases can happen without leaving the chat interface. Merchants who handle and ship these orders would pay OpenAI a commission on each sale.

This push represents a notable change for the San Francisco‑based start‑up, which is still running at a loss despite a valuation of about $300 billion. Until now, most of its income comes from subscription fees for premium services.

Commissions on e-commerce sales would become a new revenue source for OpenAI

By cutting a percentage from transactions by users on the free tier, OpenAI would unlock a new source of income that it has not yet tapped.

The move also raises the stakes for Google, as more people turn to chatbots for searching and finding products instead of using traditional search engines.

Because the checkout feature remains under development, specifics could shift before launch. Still, OpenAI and Shopify have shown early versions of the system to companies and hashed out details of their financial arrangement, according to the insiders.

Shopify supplies technology that other platforms can adopt for checkout. It already underpins shopping features on social apps like TikTok, letting users buy items without leaving the host site.

At present, ChatGPT’s product suggestions appear based on how well they match a user’s question and any context the model has, such as past interactions or a budget limit supplied in instructions. 

A recent upgrade to ChatGPT’s memory allows the system to recall individual preferences, making recommendations more tailored over time. Yet after an item is chosen, OpenAI may display different merchants selling that product. 

The company says that the list is created from product and merchant metadata provided by third parties. The sequence in which sellers appear is largely determined by those data suppliers.

Right now, the platform doesn’t consider variables like shipping or price costs when ordering the merchant list. OpenAI notes that it is expecting this integration to evolve as the experience of shopping on the platform continues to improve. 

Advertising firms are experimenting with artificial intelligence optimization (AIO)

Advertising companies and brands have begun experimenting with ways to influence search results by crafting content that the model is likely to pick up, a practice some in the industry have dubbed “AIO,” akin to search engine optimization.

“It starts to pose big and difficult questions around what ‘preferences’ AI shows in its results,” according to an advertising executive. The executive further added that it could destroy paid search from platforms using traditional techniques. It would also change how advertising firms work today.

Earlier, OpenAI insisted it was not actively planning on pursuing advertising. Yet in an interview with the Financial Times, the chief financial officer said the company is now looking at options to integrate advertising, however it is yet to be decided where and when to implement it. 

In March, Sam Altman said in a newsletter: “We’re never going to take money to change placement or whatever, but if you buy something through Deep Research that you found, we’re going to charge like a 2 percent affiliate fee or something.”

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