Walmart launches Agent Gateway; Agent Profiles planned for next month
Walmart announced Agent Gateway, an MCP-based interface that lets approved AI agents retrieve inventory and place orders for shoppers on Walmart.com and Sam’s Club. The service begins as a beta for companies and developers. Agent Profiles, planned to roll out next month, would give each agent a dedicated profile, separate purchase history, and either approval for every purchase or a user-set spending limit. Walmart says agents cannot access payment details or act beyond a shopper’s intent, but the supplied reports do not independently verify its privacy controls, enforcement, or adoption.
The beta gateway and planned profiles give approved agents a structured way to shop across Walmart.com and Sam’s Club while providing shoppers with separate purchase histories, approval options, spending limits, and the ability to revoke access.
Walmart is embracing agentic commerce with the launch of its own Agent Gateway to manage transactions and other new features aimed at customers using AI agents, the retailer announced on Wednesday. The move comes shortly after Walmart’s top competitor, Amazon, began blocking AI agents from making purchases on behalf of online shoppers.
The company’s embrace of AI technology differentiates it from other online businesses, including not only Amazon but also various travel and booking sites, which have responded to the growing consumer adoption of AI agents by locking them out of their websites completely. Walmart, on the other hand, had already announced a partnership with a leading agent in the space, Meta’s Muse, and offers integrations with popular AI apps like ChatGPT, Gemini, and others.
Now, it’s expanding on those efforts with more technology to prepare for a world where AI agents become mainstream, said Walmart President and CEO John Furner, speaking at the Masters of Scale Summit in San Francisco on Wednesday. The technology will support agentic shopping from both Walmart and the company’s discount warehouse, Sam’s Club.
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