The future of retail with agentic AI

The retail world is standing at a turning point. For years, e-commerce has been about moving shopping transactions from bricks and mortar stores to screens — digitising discovery, choice and checkout. But we’re now seeing the rise of AI agents that act on behalf of shoppers, which will change the social, emotional and status elements of shopping as we know it. 

 

According to McKinsey, agentic AI could drive between $3 trillion and $5 trillion in global commerce by 2030, fundamentally reshaping how people buy. That makes this more than a technological trend. It’s a behavioural and cultural shift with vast commercial stakes. The real question for retailers is what kind of experience they choose to create in a world where the shopper may no longer be human.

 

Instead of asking, “how do we sell online”, retail leaders now need to ask the harder question of “how do we keep shopping meaningful, rewarding and culturally relevant when AI might be doing the choosing?” Retailers must take this as an unprecedented opportunity and act now.

 

 

Shopping as an experience 

Shopping has always been more than an exchange of goods. It’s a social ritual, emotional regulator, a way of showing brand connection, status and loyalty, and a way people express identity and connect with each other. 

 

As AI agents begin to manage more of the buying process, that emotional layer risks being stripped away. If retailers treat this shift purely as an efficiency play — letting algorithms optimise what’s “best” — they’ll end up with faster transactions but weaker customer relationships.

 

The smarter approach sees AI agents as extensions of personal taste. When designed well, they can interpret a shopper’s style, mood or intent, and surface options that feel right rather than merely logical. Agents become curators, confident and collaborating in an individual’s self-expression. Forward-thinking companies are envisioning them as extensions of personal taste and aspiration.

 

We’re already seeing the use of AI to enhance personal online experiences play out. Marks & Spencer, for example, uses AI-powered styling tools that help shoppers find outfits suited to their body shape and preferences. Over 450,000 customers have used these tools, generating tens of millions of outfit combinations and contributing to a major rise in online fashion and homeware sales. It’s a strong reminder that the future of e-commerce can be optimised with automation and make technology feel personal.

 

 

Rethinking the path to purchase

The most immediate change agentic shopping will bring is to the “browse-to-buy” journey. Traditional e-commerce is designed for human eyes — visual grids, carousels, endless scrolling. But agents don’t browse like that. They process structured data through price, quality, sustainability, reviews and delivery timelines.

 

Retailers now need to make their digital shelves readable for both humans and machines. That means richer product metadata and contextual detail that helps AI agents make smart recommendations. A product page will evolve from a display to a dataset.

 

Perhaps the most transformative frontier in agentic e-commerce is visual technology. Historically, e-commerce has been constrained by the friction of physical distance, in the sense that you cannot touch, try, or adjust items through a screen. AI-powered visual systems are rapidly dissolving these constraints. Advances in skin tone matching, fabric visualisation, and virtual try-on technology represent a quantum leap in shopping quality. 

 

An AI agent equipped with accurate body metrics and sophisticated 3D modelling can now predict fit with remarkable accuracy. A shopper can see how an item of clothing will look not just on a generic model, but on a representation of their own body, in their own context, under their own lighting.

 

Companies investing in these technologies now, such as building robust body scanning systems, developing dynamic fabric simulations, or creating accurate lighting models, are laying the groundwork for the next generation of e-commerce. The payoff will be a shopping experience that feels both frictionless and substantive, efficient and immersive.

 

As AI starts making more of the choices; sales might rise but managing that growth and new decision-making processes will be more complicated. For example, returns could increase if agents have taken too many risks in advancing personal style or if brand size guides are inaccurate. Customers might seek different reassurance from their brands. Smart retailers are already thinking about how to evolve return policies, sizing tools and recommendation logic to serve this new pattern.

 

Retailers like US-based Zappos proved years ago that frictionless returns can strengthen loyalty. In an agentic world, that principle is even more powerful. When customers know their AI can buy freely, confident that mistakes are easy to undo, they’ll shop more often and more boldly. Retailers that see returns as part of the experience will benefit from greater long-term trust and engagement.

 

 

The emotional dimension of e-commerce

Perhaps the most underrated challenge in all of this is taste and the emotional dimensions of choice. Humans don’t always shop rationally. We buy for how things make us feel, not just what they do. We fall for design, colour, story and aspiration, or to boost our mood.

 

The next generation of retail AI must learn to reflect that nuance. Rather than optimising purely for “purchase probability,” it will need to optimise for delight — for the spark of discovery that makes a shopper feel seen. Imagine an agent that occasionally suggests something unexpected but relevant, mirroring the intuition of a great in-store stylist or best friend. That’s what will make agentic commerce successful and allow humans to embrace it.

 

The future of e-commerce won’t belong to those who automate the fastest or only aspire for higher conversion rates. It will belong to people who design human and agent experiences that enable decision making, self-expression and delight. 

 

Brands must remember that even when the shopper is an algorithm, the customer is still a person who is driven by feeling and imagination. This is an invitation to reinvent the cultural exchanges in e-commerce. Are you in? 

 

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Cathal McCarthy is Chief Strategy Officer at Kore.ai

 

Main image courtesy of iStockPhoto.com and Ankabala