Retailers Are Fighting Back Against AI Agents: Shopify and Amazon Restrict External AI, Walmart Blocks Agent Checkout, and 81 Percent of Executives Fear AI Will Destroy Brand Loyalty

Six months ago, retailers raced to get their products inside ChatGPT. Shopify President Harley Finkelstein called it "the new frontier." Etsy, Walmart, and Target lined up. Today the mood has reversed. Shopify and Amazon are now restricting external AI agents inside their platforms. Walmart, which built its own AI assistant Sparky, has quietly added guidelines preventing outside agents from taking users to checkout pages or placing orders. Deloitte's 2026 Retail Industry Global Outlook found that 81 percent of retail executives believe generative AI will weaken brand loyalty by 2027.

Why are retailers pulling back from external AI agents?

The threat is not AI itself. Retailers are spending heavily on their own AI tools. Walmart's Sparky has produced 35 percent higher order values in early tests. Amazon launched Rufus and Auto Buy across its app. Alexa+, free to 250 million Prime members, went generally available in February 2026 and tripled per-user shopping activity, according to PYMNTS reporting. Internal AI keeps customers inside the retailer's own search, ad, and loyalty surfaces.

The threat is external AI: ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini agents that handle discovery and potentially the transaction outside the retailer's control. Wharton marketing professor Kartik Hosanagar put it directly to Retail Dive: "Whoever controls the agents now has the power." If consumers find products through ChatGPT instead of Amazon Search, Amazon loses both the search query data and the ad slot it would have sold against that query. The customer relationship goes with them. Circana retail analyst Marshal Cohen captured the merchant view in a Modern Retail interview: retailers do not want to "become a commodity-based business" where an AI agent picks the cheapest option from a flat catalog.

Three strategies are emerging

The first is to build proprietary AI and keep customers inside the platform. Amazon's Rufus and Auto Buy, Walmart's Sparky, and Alexa+ all serve this role. Adobe reported that AI-driven traffic to retail sites surged 693 percent during the 2025 holiday season, with AI-referred shoppers 38 percent more likely to convert. If that traffic is going to arrive, retailers want it landing on their own pages.

The second is to restrict external AI activity. Shopify and Amazon are tightening rules on agent access. Walmart blocks third-party agents from completing transactions. Scraping is being limited. Data access is being controlled at the technical level, not just at the policy level.

The third is selective collaboration. Target, Sephora, Nordstrom, and Walmart are building dedicated apps inside ChatGPT that route users back to the retailer's own checkout after the AI does the discovery work. AI gets the conversation. The retailer keeps the transaction, the loyalty data, and the customer record.

The 72 billion dollar defense

US retail media spending will reach 71.98 billion dollars in 2026, according to eMarketer's March 2026 forecast. That revenue depends on consumers searching within retailer platforms such as Amazon Search, Walmart.com, and Target Circle. External AI agents that handle product discovery threaten every dollar of that spending. eMarketer noted that AI shopping agents bypassing traditional search "reduce the value of sponsored product placements." Brands that depend on display ads and keyword bidding lose visibility into shopper behavior the moment a Perplexity Comet or ChatGPT agent makes the selection for the consumer.

The 81 percent Deloitte figure is not hypothetical anxiety. It is a strategic read on what happens to retail margins if brand loyalty erodes because AI agents recommend on price and reviews alone. The retail media advertising model that funds free shipping, loyalty programs, and seller subsidies comes under pressure if the agent layer disintermediates the retailer search bar.

Mubboo's Take

The retailer pushback against external AI agents creates a clear market split. Amazon, Walmart, and Shopify are building walls to protect their search-and-advertising revenue. ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google are building agents designed to reach across those walls. The consumer sits in the middle, looking for the right product at the right price. Independent comparison platforms like Mubboo are structurally outside that fight. Mubboo does not sell search placements, so retailer ad revenue is not threatened. Mubboo does not own the checkout, so retailer customer data is not at risk. Our shopping coverage at mubboo.com helps consumers decide before they buy, then sends them to whichever merchant they prefer, whether Amazon, Walmart, or the brand directly. When retailers restrict AI agents, they are protecting a revenue model. When Mubboo publishes an honest comparison, it is serving a decision model. Those two objectives can coexist, and the second is what the consumer actually wants.