PayPal and OpenAI Transform Shopping Experience with AI-Driven Payment Solutions

PayPal Holdings Inc. has entered into a significant collaboration with OpenAI, bringing its digital wallet directly into the ChatGPT platform to allow users to make effortless payments through the AI chatbot. Announced just before PayPal's quarterly earnings, this partnership is the first instance of a major payment company embedding its services within a large language model (LLM) for online shopping, placing both firms at the cutting edge of agentic AI commerce, according to a

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With this arrangement,

customers will have the option to use a "Buy with PayPal" feature inside ChatGPT to purchase products suggested by the AI, while sellers can showcase their goods to OpenAI’s 700 million weekly users, CNBC noted. The rollout, planned for 2026, utilizes OpenAI’s Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP), a system built to simplify transactions between AI platforms and payment services, as outlined in a . PayPal will oversee backend processes such as payment verification, merchant assignment, and resolving disputes, removing the necessity for individual sellers to connect directly with OpenAI, the release stated.

Alex Chriss, PayPal’s CEO, highlighted the importance of this alliance, describing it as “an entirely new way to shop” that fits with the rising influence of AI-powered personalization, CNBC reported. “Millions rely on ChatGPT for daily needs, and over 400 million people use PayPal for their purchases,” he stated. The partnership also broadens PayPal’s AI initiatives, giving its more than 24,000 employees access to ChatGPT Enterprise and integrating OpenAI’s Codex tool for developers, the release mentioned.

This initiative reflects OpenAI’s larger effort to generate revenue from its AI offerings. Recently, the company has teamed up with Shopify, Etsy, and Walmart to enable shopping within ChatGPT, aiming to turn the platform into a comprehensive hub for product search and buying, CNBC reported. OpenAI’s shift to a for-profit structure was necessary to secure SoftBank’s $30 billion investment, as detailed by

.

Following the news, PayPal’s shares jumped 14.1% in premarket trading, showing investor confidence in the company’s move into AI-powered commerce, according to

. This collaboration is anticipated to strengthen PayPal’s standing in the fast-changing digital payments sector, where competition is heating up as major tech firms like Google and Amazon pursue similar integrations.

This partnership also illustrates the rapid merging of AI and online retail. Experts suggest that agentic commerce—where AI acts as a personal shopping assistant—could transform how consumers shop, with pioneers like PayPal and OpenAI shaping future industry norms. For OpenAI, the deal offers a scalable system to accommodate its expanding user base, while PayPal taps into a platform with vast transaction opportunities, the PR Newswire release noted.