JD Sports launches AI shopping in US, letting customers buy through ChatGPT and Copilot

JD Sports Brings AI Commerce to US Market

British sportswear retailer JD Sports has launched AI shopping capabilities in the United States, its largest market, allowing customers to make direct purchases through AI platforms without visiting the company's website or mobile app1

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. Starting with Microsoft Copilot and extending to Google Gemini and OpenAI's ChatGPT, US customers can now search for and buy sports footwear, apparel, and accessories through conversational AI interfaces2

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. The retailer operates over 2,500 stores across the JD, DTLR, Shoe Palace, and Hibbett brands in the US, which accounts for more than 40% of its global sales1

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JD Sports has entered into a global agreement with commercetools, a digital commerce platform provider, and financial infrastructure firm Stripe to enable one-click purchases on AI assistants4

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. The integration leverages commercetools' "Agentic Jumpstart" solution alongside Stripe's Agentic Commerce Suite to connect AI-driven searches to secure checkout and payments2

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. Customers can simply tell a chatbot what they want—for example, "Find me a pair of Nike Air Max size 10"—and the AI queries JD's catalog, returning relevant products with images and details, before completing the purchase through Stripe's integrated payment flow2

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Partnerships with Commercetools and Stripe Enable Seamless Integration

The technical infrastructure behind this AI-powered shopping experience relies on sophisticated coordination between multiple platforms. Commercetools' AI Hub keeps JD's product data, pricing, and availability synchronized across all AI channels, while Stripe handles payment security and fraud protection2

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. Critically, all payment and fulfillment data still flow through JD Sports' systems, meaning the retailer retains control over inventory, pricing, and customer experience even as the shopping interface moves outside its owned properties2

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. The company plans to complete the rollout of equivalent platforms across its UK and European operations later in 20264

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The Next Era of Online Shopping Shifts to Conversational Interfaces

Jetan Chowk, JD Sports' chief technology and transformation officer, described the announcement as "an important step into the next era of online shopping" that positions JD to stay ahead as the global retail industry embraces AI1

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. Chowk told the Press Association that AI is "the future of how people will shop," noting that customers are already regularly using AI apps to research and discover products they want to buy3

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. AI usage has been booming among the retailer's core target demographic of shoppers aged between 18 and 243

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. Research from KPMG found that 30% of those aged between 25 and 34 use an AI-enabled chatbot to look for deals online3

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CEO Regis Schultz compared the impact of AI on retail to the internet boom of the late 1990s, suggesting it could shrink physical store footprints by reducing the need for cash desks2

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. Speaking at a conference in New York, Regis Schultz emphasized that "AI is reinventing the connection between the consumer and retailer," adding that giving shoppers the ability to buy straight from an AI chatbot helps them skip the line at cash desks that occupy 15% to 20% of the space in JD Sports stores5

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. Those spaces could be repurposed to stock more product instead5

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Retail Technology Transforms the Customer Journey

AI-driven shopping shifts the act of buying from browsing to intent-based conversation2

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. Instead of scrolling through hundreds of sneakers, a customer can ask for "black running shoes under $150, good for daily training," refine the request, compare options, and pay, all within the same chat2

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. The AI handles product discovery, filtering, and decision support in one flow, meaning less friction and less time spent navigating interfaces designed around catalogs rather than questions2

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. For retailers, however, this means the loss of something they've relied on for two decades: control over the shopping journey2

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Traditional e-commerce platforms are built around pages, categories, and conversion funnels, but conversational shopping ignores most of that structure2

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. When purchases happen inside chatbots, platforms lose visibility into how customers arrive at decisions, and brand differentiation becomes harder when products are presented as answers rather than destinations2

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. Several UK retailers have told The Guardian that they are working on generative engine optimization—the latest incarnation of search engine optimization—to help push their company to the top of results from AI chatbots3

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. Tactics include making sure they appear in Reddit forums, responding to reviews on Google or Trustpilot, and ensuring AI models can access the correct product data3

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Payment Security and Accountability in Agentic Commerce

Letting customers buy without visiting a website introduces new considerations around payment security and customer experience2

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. Retailers must ensure that payments remain secure, that inventory and pricing are accurate in real time, and that the brand experience doesn't dissolve into a generic AI response2

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. There's also the issue of accountability: when something goes wrong—a failed payment, a wrong size, a delayed delivery—the customer interacts with an AI, not a store, yet retailers still own the outcome even if they no longer own the interface2

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JD Sports is not alone in this shift. Retailers including Walmart and Etsy are also working with tech companies to develop AI tools that allow shoppers to go from discovery within an AI chatbot to purchase without using the retailer's website or app5

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. Walmart announced on Sunday that it was working with Google Gemini to allow customers to buy products from certain businesses without leaving Gemini's AI chat interface5

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. This represents a new challenge for retailers competing for business online, as well as undermining Google's dominance in traditional search traffic for shopping3

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. JD Sports is scheduled to issue a trading update for the Christmas quarter on January 211

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