Google launches its ‘universal’ online shopping cart ahead of the holidays

Google’s intelligent AI shopping cart is finally here, and just in time to tempt users into Black Friday and seasonal holiday spending. The Universal Cart tool Google previewed at its I/O event in May is now rolling out in the US across the Gemini app and Google Search, with the aim of making it easier to stay organized and save money when shopping online.

As the name suggests, it’s a “universal” digital cart that lets you save products from multiple retailers in a single unified space, and works across different Google platforms. That means you can find and add a bunch of products using the Gemini app and Google Search AI Mode, and they’ll all be saved to the same cart. There are also plans to integrate Universal Cart with Gmail and YouTube, but Google hasn’t announced a timeline for that yet.

Google will send you notifications about price drops and restocks for items saved in your cart, which spares you from having to check each retailer’s website individually, and can display any relevant promotional codes it finds besides the products you’ve saved. You can choose to pay for items from the cart using Google Wallet, or transfer them to the merchant’s own cart so you can checkout with the retailer directly. Together with Google Wallet, Universal Cart can also analyze the perks provided by each of your saved credit cards and help you choose the best payment method when purchasing.

The launch comes as competition in the AI-assisted shopping space is heating up, with Google rivals including OpenAI and Meta having launched agentic AI assistants that can shop online on the user’s behalf. Shopify also recently announced that it’s opening its platform up to allow more AI agents to browse and purchase from Shopify listings. Big Tech players are entering this race on the bet that the future of online shopping involves having a robot do most of the work for you.