Google’s new Universal Cart wants you to take your entire shopping journey online

At Google I/O on Tuesday, Google introduced Universal Cart, its agent hub for managing shopping in one place. The tech giant also announced updates to its Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), and announced that it will be bringing the technology to Google products in the coming months, enabling users to authorize agents to make payments on their behalf.

The ads signal Google’s quest to transform AI assistants from passive recommendation tools into active participants in online commerce. By launching a centralized shopping system and building infrastructure that allows software agents to complete purchases autonomously, the company is putting itself in a position to control more of the entire shopping journey, and perhaps the relationship between consumers and the merchants vying for their attention.

With Universal Cart, users can add products they’re considering from anywhere on Google — while browsing search, chatting with Gemini, watching YouTube, or reading Gmail. Once items are added, Universal Cart tracks deals, monitors price drops, displays price history insights, and alerts users when items are back in stock.

This feature is built around something Google knows well, which is that most people shop across multiple devices, multiple retailers, and over the course of several days.

The shopping cart also uses artificial intelligence to help shoppers make better decisions. For example, if you’re building your first custom PC, you might add parts from multiple dealers to one cart, and Google might flag compatibility issues — like a processor that doesn’t work with the motherboard you selected — and suggest an alternative.

For frequent flyers or those who max out rewards, this feature can also show hidden savings and help expand your points even more because it’s built on Google Wallet.

With Google’s open-standards Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP), users can checkout directly through Google with participating merchants, or take their items to the merchant’s site and complete their purchase there.

Google says Universal Cart is rolling out in the US today and will arrive in the Gemini app this summer, with YouTube and Gmail to follow.

Google also announced that UCP is expanding to include more categories, such as hotels and local food delivery services. The UCP-supported trials will also expand beyond the US to Canada and Australia in the coming months, and later to the UK.

Perhaps the most important announcement for the commerce industry is AP2, Google’s protocol designed to allow artificial intelligence agents to securely make payments on behalf of users within specified limits. At I/O, Google detailed the guardrails users can set, including deciding which brands and products they want, and spending caps. When these conditions are met, the agent automatically makes the purchase.

Google says it will bring AP2 to its own products in the coming months. This integration would give Google direct visibility into what consumers discover, think about and ultimately buy, a degree of commerce impact that retailers and payment processors will be watching closely.

Under the hood, AP2 creates a transparent, verifiable link between the user, merchant and payment processor, with encryption that protects user data at all times. The protocol also includes tamper-resistant digital records that ensure the agent is always acting on behalf of the user, and a permanent audit trail that both buyers and sellers can refer to regarding returns or disputes.

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