Artificial intelligence is no longer a future concept for the retail sector—it’s a present-day reality, with consumer adoption of AI for shopping in Australia now surpassing the global average.
A new report, the 2025 AI Shopping Index from Klaviyo, reveals that 86% of Australians have used AI tools for online shopping in the last three months. This figure outpaces the global average by 10 percentage points, marking Australia as an early adopter of AI in e-commerce.
Australian consumers are primarily leveraging AI assistants for immediate and tangible benefits:
- Finding the best deals (40%)
- Saving time (17%)
- Getting personalised recommendations (13%)
Respondents feel most comfortable using AI when shopping online for categories like travel, beauty, and entertainment.
Nicole Birbas, director of customer success, Klaviyo comments, ““It’s important to understand that AI plays two key roles in the consumer journey. The first is discovery — where consumers use tools like ChatGPT and Gemini to find new products and brands based on their needs. The second is brand interaction — when customers visit your website and want to ask questions about specific products they’re considering or about shipping and returns policies.
She adds, ““To drive growth, profitability and long-term customer value, retailers need to embrace both. For the first role, brands need to learn how AI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini gather data to make recommendations. Then they need to hone their marketing to make sure they show up in AI-generated content. For the second role, brands need to embed AI directly into the customer experience so it can anticipate customers’ needs and remove friction from the experience.”
Consumers still wary
While consumers are turning to AI to help them shop, they maintain significant reservations about how brands use the technology. The research clearly indicates that the fastest way for a brand to lose consumer trust is by misusing personal data for AI—cited by 37% as their top concern.
This is closely followed by a fear of a failure to escalate to a human when needed. This wariness suggests that retailers must be highly strategic about AI implementation, especially ahead of major sales events like Black Friday and Cyber Monday..
Birbas advises, ““What’s important here is not what retailers can do with the data that AI provides; it’s what AI itself can do with the data it’s looking at. By reading into customers’ behaviour; like what products people are buying, how much they’re spending, how often they’re purchasing; AI can help uncover a whole host of trends that retailers can use to improve their products and personalise their marketing”.
“But one of the areas many retailers are missing out on at the moment is AI’s ability to be the perfect round-the-clock customer service agent. Because AI can analyse past behaviour, it can learn customers’ preferences and then automatically make smart personalised product recommendations, and even handle common questions about shipping, returns or sizing. It’s an easy way to make shopping feel more personal and intuitive — at a time when intent to purchase is really high.
From novelty to core expectation
According to the research, the perception of brand-owned AI assistants has shifted from a novelty to a core consumer expectation. Roughly three in five Australians expect AI shopping assistants to be a normal part of online shopping by 2026.
Retailers must adapt. – over three in four shoppers admit they have abandoned a purchase simply because they could not get immediate answers to their questions. Bribas observes, “During peak shopping moments like BFCM, retailers face a surge in orders, fulfillment, queries and returns. During this time, customer service is the number one make-or-break factor that will drive future repeat orders and long term loyalty”.
“Delivering great customer service during these peak periods is always a challenge, especially when orders and questions come in thick and fast. But AI is great at handling these spikes in demand. It scales automatically to whatever your levels of demand are, and instantly answers any simple questions customers have, while flagging the more complex ones to your human team”.
Looking ahead, Australians want AI shopping assistants to do even more next year. Their top desires include having AI help them:
- Find and compare products
- Stick to a budget
- Suggest complete outfits
This growing list of expectations presents a significant opportunity for retailers to invest strategically in AI technology to meet evolving brand demands.
AI beyond the cart
Consumer confidence in using AI is expanding to more complex interactions once reserved for human agents. While shoppers still strongly prefer AI for simple, instant answers, they are increasingly open to using it for the entire post-purchase journey.
“With 88% of Australians open to AI managing post-purchase tasks and 81% happy to receive personalised reorders, there’s a huge opportunity for brands to let AI handle the routine — while human teams focus on what matters most, such as empathy, creativity, and meaningful engagement. The brands that get this balance right will ultimately see the biggest returns”, says Birbas.
