OpenAI has launched ChatGPT Wallet, a feature that lets its AI agents help you decide what to buy and then complete the purchase for you. ChatGPT's agents, which OpenAI calls dots, can now check out on a user's behalf. The feature is starting with a limited number of ChatGPT Pro subscribers in the US, aged 18 and over, with a US-issued Visa, Mastercard or American Express card. It is not available in South Africa (yet).

Users add a payment card to the Wallet once, then ask their agent to help with a purchase. Before anything is bought, they review the items, the total and the card being used, and approve the purchase with Face ID or a fingerprint, which creates a record of the transaction.

The card details themselves are never shared with the agent or the shop. ChatGPT pays with a payment token, a stand-in for the real card number, and passes the shop only what it needs to deliver the order, such as the shipping address. Users keep their card rewards and the usual protections, including the right to dispute a transaction.

OpenAI plans to add spending limits and rules for categories or time periods, so users can pre-approve some purchases and let the agent handle them on its own. Getting shops on board is the harder part. Some retailers block AI agents from their sites, and the largest to do so is Amazon, which wants shoppers to use its own assistant, Alexa, instead.

OpenAI has published a Commerce Partner Playbook to help retailers prepare. Demand so far is mixed: DoorDash and Uber have reported very few orders from AI agents, while Meta says shopping has become a top activity on its Muse assistant, which has more than 10 million users.

TechCrunch's Sarah Perez reported the launch and noted that consumer AI tools are still searching for the right fit as shopping assistants. OpenAI's announcement stresses that users stay fully in control of each purchase. OpenAI's Commerce Partner Playbook sets out how retailers can support customers who shop through agents.

For now, this is a small US experiment. But it points to a shift South African retailers should watch. If people start sending an AI agent to compare and buy, the shop that wins is the one the agent can read and check out from easily, not necessarily the one with the best-looking website. That is why OpenAI has published a playbook for retailers, and why Amazon is blocking outside agents to protect its own.

There is a local twist, though. OpenAI's own data shows South Africans use ChatGPT less than most countries for looking things up and asking about products, as we found when we looked at how South Africans use ChatGPT, so local demand for agent shopping may take time.

The security design is familiar too. Paying with a token instead of the card number is the same approach behind Apple Pay and VezoPay's payment ring, and it is what makes letting software spend your money tolerable at all. Agent shopping also arrives just as ChatGPT started showing ads in South Africa, so the same assistant may soon both advertise to you and buy for you.

You might also like our piece on TikTok's AI shopping assistant, Amazon vs Takealot Black Friday prices, and AI agent swarms in Minecraft.

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