Google plans to expand access later in October, ahead of India’s festive shopping season, one person familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.
The test pushes Google’s AI shopping tools further into the transaction itself. Gemini and AI Mode already surface product information and recommendations, but the new flow gives some shoppers a way to move directly from a product result into checkout.
A Google spokesperson said the company is “always testing new features and experiences to help people discover and connect with businesses more easily,” but declined to provide additional details about the experiment.
The Flipkart checkout experience appears different from another purchasing system Google has previously demonstrated. Earlier this year, the company introduced the Universal Commerce Protocol, or UCP, an open standard designed to help AI agents work with retailers across different stages of a shopping transaction.
Google has said UCP can support purchases from eligible products through Gemini and AI Mode using checkout hosted by Google. It later added capabilities that allow shoppers to transfer items to a retailer’s website to finish a transaction.
In the current Flipkart test, however, tapping Buy opens a checkout flow carrying Flipkart’s branding while the shopper remains inside Gemini or AI Mode. The technology behind that experience has not been disclosed.
Google said earlier this month that Flipkart was among the merchants working with it on what the company calls agentic shopping experiences in India, though it did not reveal details of this test at the time.
The two companies also have a financial relationship. Google invested about $350 million in Flipkart in 2024 as part of a funding round led by Walmart, giving Google a minority stake in the e-commerce company.
The new purchase option is not appearing across every retailer shown in Google’s AI shopping results. In the experience viewed by TechCrunch, Amazon products appeared alongside Flipkart listings, but the Amazon results did not include the same direct Buy button.
India has more than a billion internet subscribers and is a major market for both Flipkart and Amazon. Competition between the two platforms becomes particularly intense during the festive shopping period, when retailers roll out some of their largest promotions.
For now, Google’s test remains limited in both users and products. But it shows the company experimenting with a version of AI shopping that moves beyond helping consumers choose products and into handling more of the purchasing process itself.
This analysis is based on reporting from TechCrunch.
Image courtesy of Inc42.
This article was generated with AI assistance and reviewed for accuracy and quality.
