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Shopping appears to be one of the big pushes for AI in 2026, and Google is giving Gemini about as large as a boost as it could in this arena thanks to a new partnership with Walmart.
These two brands have partnered to bring products and shopping experiences from Walmart and Sam’s Club to Gemini users in the US, with plans to expand internationally in the future. Through this integration, Gemini will recommend both in-store and online products to its users “when it’s relevant.” Walmart’s announcement includes the example of providing camping equipment suggestions to a customer when asked specifically for advice on what to buy. Users will also be able to link their accounts to include recommendations based on past Walmart or Sam’s Club orders.
On its face, this appears to be more of a shift on Walmart’s behalf towards a future where search plays a smaller role in shopping decisions, rather than a revolutionary new tool built from the ground up by Google. In fact, Walmart serves as the developer behind this experience, not Google; the company says it was built using the Universal Commerce Protocol (or UCP), launched this weekend alongside partners like Shopify, Etsy, and Wayfair.
Walmart is about as large a partner as Google could hope to score here — Amazon’s really the only competition that comes close to outperforming its shopping rival at scale, but its own focus on AI assistants means it was never bound to be part of the UCP or Gemini. Walmart has also previously announced a similar partnership with OpenAI, as practically every player in the AI chatbot game looks to expand its efforts out into the world of e-commerce.
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