Less than a year after launching the Instant Checkout feature, which enabled ChatGPT users in the US to buy products from regular ChatGPT responses, OpenAI has decided to abandon the feature.
According to The Information, OpenAI plans to move this functionality into merchant apps available within the ChatGPT ecosystem, such as Instacart or Booking.com.
Furthermore, in February 2026, eBay banned third-party ‘buy-for-me’ agents and AI chatbots from interacting with the platform without previous authorization.
As a result, consumers can no longer use LLM-driven bots to place orders on eBay that weren’t reviewed by a human.
The news has brought the future of agentic commerce into question, with skeptics claiming shoppers don’t feel confident outsourcing the checkout process to AI because of their shopping habits and lack of trust in buy-for-me agents.
Read on to discover why OpenAI is pulling back on its Instant Checkout functionality after months of testing and what this decision means for the future of agentic commerce on online marketplaces.
