Amazon and Shopify make starkly different moves in the brewing battle over AI shopping

Amazon and Shopify have taken markedly different approaches to Meta’s AI shopping assistant, Muse. Amazon is moving to keep Muse off its platform, effectively blocking the assistant from operating in its ecosystem. The company’s decision signals a choice to restrict integration with that particular third-party AI tool.

By contrast, Shopify has embraced a relationship with Muse, entering a partnership focused on payment technology. The collaboration suggests Shopify is open to integrating Muse into parts of its commerce stack, specifically around how transactions are processed and managed.

Taken together, the two moves highlight a split in strategy among leading e-commerce companies: one opting to limit external AI assistants’ presence within its environment, the other choosing to incorporate and build on the assistant’s capabilities. Each path could influence how merchants and shoppers experience AI-driven shopping features going forward.

Neither action necessarily reflects the companies’ broader AI policies beyond Muse, but they do underscore how platform owners can shape which assistants and tools gain access to key commercial functions such as product discovery and payments. The choices by Amazon and Shopify may have implications for competition and interoperability among AI shopping services and payment providers.