Best AI Tools for Ecommerce in 2026

AI tools for ecommerce cover content creation, customer service, pricing, fraud detection, and product discovery.

Twenty-nine percent of companies with less than $100 million in revenue have scaled AI, compared with nearly half of those with more than $5 billion in revenue, according to McKinsey’s State of AI in 2025 report, based on a survey of 1,993 participants across 105 countries. Choosing AI tools matched to specific business problems is how smaller operations close that gap.

This guide covers the features, costs, and ecommerce applications of the top AI tools available today, along with a framework for choosing the right one for your ecommerce store.

How ecommerce businesses use AI today

Nearly 40% of small businesses are already using or planning to use AI, according to the Federal Reserve’s 2024 Small Business Credit Survey. A 2025 Shopify survey also found that 75% of Shopify store owners now use AI tools.* 

Here’s how store owners are putting AI tools to work.

Boost efficiency and automate routine work

AI tools can help create content, conduct target audience and market research, automate routine tasks, and handle certain types of customer interactions. 

Fifty-five percent of store owners say AI tools save time on repetitive tasks, per the same Shopify survey.*

Sara Bako, president of fashion brand Maggy London, says Shopify Sidekick frees up around 20% of the workweek. “Sidekick frees up at least a full day of work each week. Reporting time has improved by roughly 10 times (1,000%),” she says. “What used to take days of prep for buy meetings now takes just a few hours, with full buy plans completed in the same window."

Personalize marketing and product discovery

AI marketing tools analyze demographic and user behavior data to segment audiences and personalize messages, recommendations, and search results at scale. 

A 2024 BCG survey of 23,000 consumers found that approximately four-fifths are comfortable with personalized experiences, and a large majority expect companies to offer them.

Improve customer service and support

AI tools handle routine inquiries around the clock, analyze customer reviews for recurring issues, and surface sentiment patterns across support conversations. 

Fifty-eight percent of online shoppers never receive a response after reaching out to customer service, according to PissedConsumer’s 2025 survey of more than 40,000 consumers. 

Salesforce’s 7th State of Service report, based on a survey of 6,500 service professionals, found that 30% of service cases are currently handled by AI, with that figure projected to reach 50% by 2027.

Strengthen security and fraud detection

AI tools detect anomalies in transaction data in real time, authenticate online payments, and flag cyberattack vulnerabilities before they’re exploited. 

Ecommerce fraud is projected to rise from $56 billion in 2025 to $131 billion in 2030, a 133% increase over the period, according to Juniper Research.

Quick comparison: AI tools for ecommerce at a glance

AI tools for ecommerce

The tools below are organized by function. Each entry includes confirmed features, current pricing, and the ecommerce use case it addresses.

AI content creation and SEO tools

Content creation is the most common AI use case among store owners, with 69% using AI for content generation, per a Shopify survey.* The tools below cover product descriptions, blog posts, marketing copy, and on-page SEO.

Sidekick

Sidekick is an AI commerce assistant built into the Shopify admin, included with every Shopify plan. It handles guidance, content generation, app building, and task completion in plain language. 

Sidekick has direct access to your Shopify data and understands commerce workflows. Sidekick Pulse proactively researches your store and surfaces personalized recommendations based on your store’s data and market trends.

Use cases: Store management, content generation, automation, analytics, app building

Features:

• Content generation for product descriptions, blog posts, and email marketing AI-powered image editing and background generation
• Store design editing via plain language commands
• Workflow automation with Shopify Flow
• Custom app creation from plain language prompts
• Data analysis and custom report generation
• Proactive store recommendations (Sidekick Pulse)
• Text, voice, and screen sharing on desktop and mobile

Pricing:

• Included with all Shopify plans

ChatGPT

ChatGPT by OpenAI can handle a wide range of written content needs for ecommerce businesses.

Some ecommerce stores might use ChatGPT as an AI writing tool for product descriptions, blog posts, social media posts, and marketing emails. It also supports market research, keyword research, content ideation, SEO optimization, and copy editing.

OpenAI offers a free plan alongside several paid tiers. Paid plans provide expanded access to more capable models, advanced data analysis, image generation, and web browsing. 

Use cases: Written content creation, research

Features:

• Natural language processing (NLP) capabilities
• Content creation, proofreading, editing, and translation
• Market and keyword research
• Ability to create images from text prompts
• Web browsing

Pricing:

• Free plan available
• Go: $8 per user per month
• Plus: $20 per user per month
• Pro: $100 to $200 per user per month
• Business: $20 per user per month (billed annually), $25 per user per month (billed monthly); minimum two users
• Enterprise: Contact for custom pricing

Jasper AI

Jasper AI generates written content including advertisements, articles, and product descriptions. Its brand voice feature analyzes existing content to identify a brand’s tone, then applies that understanding to new content. Voice and tone parameters can also be entered manually.

The Pro plan supports multiple brand voices, image generation, and content collaboration. The Business plan adds unlimited custom AI agents, API access, SSO, and a dedicated customer success manager.

Use case: Written content creation

Features:

• NLP capabilities
• Custom brand voices
• Content pipelines and campaign workflows
• Content creation, editing, and repurposing
• Image generation

Pricing:

• Pro: $59 per month (billed annually), $69 per month (billed monthly)
• Business: Contact for custom pricing

Surfer

Surfer (previously SurferSEO) is an on-page SEO and content optimization tool. Its AI content generation feature produces optimized articles from a target keyword. Users enter the keyword, review a generated outline, then generate the full article. 

Surfer also provides SEO feedback on human-written content. Higher-tier plans include site-wide SEO audit functions and up to five times higher usage limits.

Use cases: On-page SEO, content generation

Features:

• Keyword research
• Content generation
• Content optimization
• SEO audits (Scale and Enterprise plans)

Pricing:

• Standard: $90 per month (billed annually), $119 per month (billed monthly)
• Pro: $182 per month (billed annually), $219 per month (billed monthly)
• Enterprise: Contact for custom pricing

AI customer service and chatbot tools

AI customer service tools handle routine inquiries automatically, surface conversation data for human agents, and keep support available outside business hours. 

The tools below range from Shopify’s built-in chat to enterprise-grade conversational AI platforms.

Shopify Inbox

Shopify Inbox is a free live chat tool built into the Shopify admin that lets store owners chat with customers while they browse. 

Seventy percent of Shopify Inbox conversations are with customers actively making a purchasing decision. When chatting, store owners can see what a customer has viewed, what’s in their cart, and their past orders. 

Shopify’s AI tools can generate suggested instant answers and replies based on store content, which can be reviewed and sent or edited. Automated messages handle order status updates, and conversations that start in chat can continue over email.

Use cases: Customer support, sales conversion

Features:

• AI-generated instant answers and suggested replies
• Live cart and order history visibility during conversations
• Automated order status updates
• Conversation-to-email continuity
• Team inbox with assignable conversations

Pricing:

• Free for all Shopify store owners

Boost.AI

Boost.ai is an enterprise conversational AI platform designed for regulated industries including banking, insurance, telecom, and the public sector.

It deploys as an autonomous virtual agent for customer self-service, an agent assist tool that generates suggested responses for human agents, or both.

The platform handles customer requests over chat and voice, combining traditional natural language understanding (NLU) with generative AI for response accuracy. Boost.ai was named a Leader in the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Conversational AI Platforms, with more than 600 live virtual agents deployed.

Use case: Enterprise customer support

Features:

• NLP and generative AI capabilities
• Autonomous virtual agent (self-service)
• Agent assist mode with suggested responses
• Chat and voice automation
• Integrations with enterprise platforms

Pricing:

• Must contact sales for a demo and custom pricing.

AI marketing and personalization tools

AI marketing tools use behavioral and purchase data to surface the right products to the right shoppers at the right stage of their journey. The tools below cover on-site search and discovery, user-generated content, and visual product recommendations.

Shopify Search & Discovery

Shopify Search & Discovery is a free app built by Shopify that gives store owners control over how customers search and browse their store. 

Store owners can customize search and collection filters, create synonym groups to match shopper search terms, and boost specific products in results. Related and complementary product recommendations appear on product detail pages. Built-in analytics track search and discovery performance. 

Use cases: On-site search, product discovery, recommendations

Features:

• Customizable collection and search filters
• Synonym groups for search term matching
• Product boosts for search result prioritization
• Related and complementary product recommendations
• Search and discovery analytics

Pricing:

• Free for all Shopify store owners

Bazaarvoice

Bazaarvoice is a ratings, reviews, and social commerce platform. Brands and retailers use it to collect, display, and syndicate user-generated content across their own sites and retail partner networks. Supported content types include reviews, photos, and creator content.

Bazaarvoice structures pricing across multiple tiers customized to business needs; specific pricing is not publicly disclosed. AI and insights features are available as a separate product line, Bazaarvoice HarmonyAI, alongside the core ratings, reviews, and social content products. 

Use cases: Ratings and reviews, social commerce, user-generated content

Features:

• Ratings and reviews collection and display
• UGC syndication across retail networks
• Creator marketing and influencer management
• AI content recommendations (Advanced and Enterprise plans)
• Shoppable photo and video galleries
• Social commerce analytics

Pricing:

• Contact Bazaarvoice for pricing

ViSenze

ViSenze is an AI search and discovery platform that helps online retailers improve product findability and increase conversions.

It offers six machine learning recommendation engines for product personalization, along with visual search that lets shoppers find products using images instead of text. 

The platform includes a native A/B testing tool and conversion funnel analytics to analyze customer behavior and support data-driven merchandising decisions.

Use cases: Product discovery, visual search, recommendations

Features:

• Visual search (image-based product discovery)
• Six AI recommendation engines
• AI text, similar, and social search
• Conversion funnel analytics
• A/B testing
• No-code widgets and API integration

Pricing:

• Contact ViSenze for a demo and custom pricing.

AI media and creative tools

AI media tools reduce the time and cost of producing visual content for marketing, social media, and product pages. The tool below covers video generation and editing.

Runway

Runway is an AI video generation and editing platform. Store owners can generate original videos from text or image prompts, restyle shots, change lighting, and add or remove elements from existing footage using text descriptions. 

Use cases: Video generation and editing

Features:

• Video generation from text and image prompts
• Style transformations and scene restyling
• Object addition and removal
• Generative audio and text-to-speech
• Video upscaling
• Performance capture (Pro and above)

Pricing:

• Free plan available (125 one-time credits)
• Standard: $12 per user per month (billed annually), $15 per user per month (billed monthly) 
• Pro: $28 per user per month (billed annually), $35 per user per month (billed monthly) 
• Unlimited: $76 per user per month (billed annually), $95 per user per month (billed monthly)
• Enterprise: Contact for custom pricing

AI pricing and merchandising tools

AI pricing tools track competitor prices in real time and automate repricing decisions based on rules set by the store owner. 

The tool below covers competitor monitoring and dynamic pricing strategies for online retailers.

Prisync

Prisync is a competitor price tracking and dynamic pricing platform for online retailers. It offers three monitoring models: URL-based, channel-based, and a hybrid of both. All plans track unlimited competitors. 

The Dynamic Pricing Engine is available as an add-on across all plans at an additional 20% on top of the monthly subscription fee.

Use cases: Pricing optimization, competitor monitoring

Features:

• Competitor price monitoring (URL-based, channel-based, or hybrid)
• Stock availability monitoring
• Price position comparison
• Dynamic Pricing Engine (Premium and above)
• Marketplace and product variant price tracking (Premium and above)
• Price history and MAP monitoring (Platinum)
• Excel reports and email notifications

Pricing (URL-based monitoring):

• Professional: $99 per month (up to 100 products)
• Premium: $199 per month (up to 1,000 products)
• Platinum: $399 per month (up to 5,000 products)

How to choose the right AI tool for your ecommerce business

Eighty-six percent of retailers have unified commerce initiatives underway and 76% are increasing AI investment, according to Salesforce’s sixth Connected Shoppers Report. Here’s how to choose the right AI tool for your ecommerce business. 

Prioritize integration with your store

Check whether a tool connects with your existing platform and tech stack before evaluating any other feature. 

For Shopify store owners, many third-party AI tools connect directly via the Shopify App Store or through the Shopify CLI. Shopify’s guide to connecting AI tools covers how to install apps, review data access permissions, and manage what each tool can read or modify in your store.

Look for free or low-cost plans

AI tools like ChatGPT and Runway offer a free tier or trial period. Testing a tool against your own store’s data and content is the only reliable way to evaluate whether its outputs are accurate and useful for your specific catalog and customers.

Several tools covered in this guide are free for Shopify store owners, including Shopify Sidekick, Shopify Inbox, and Shopify Search & Discovery. 

Focus on solving a specific business problem

Identify a specific challenge in your ecommerce operations before selecting a tool. Tools built around a defined use case, such as competitor price tracking, product description generation, or customer support automation, can deliver more measurable results. 

Consider scalability and learning capabilities

Check whether a tool improves through machine learning as it processes more data, or requires constant manual tuning to stay accurate. Also check how it performs as product catalog size and order volume grow. Some tools degrade or require plan upgrades at higher volumes.

Check for AI search and discovery readiness

AI is reshaping how shoppers find products before they reach your store. Thirty-nine percent of consumers and 54% of Gen Z already use AI for product discovery, according to Salesforce’s Connected Shoppers Report. 

When evaluating tools, consider whether they support structured product data, syndicate reviews, or content to AI platforms, and generate product descriptions with enough specificity to appear in AI-generated recommendations.

*Based on a 2025 survey of 500 Shopify merchants conducted in English across Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, New Zealand, and the United States. Respondents were established merchants with two or more years on the platform. Results reflect the experiences of this specific sample and may not be representative of all merchants.