Instead of shopping online through websites, customers today and tomorrow could increasingly use AI agents instead to discover the products they’re looking for. Tom Cheesewright, renowned futurist with applied experience in the global 500 and governments, talks about agentic commerce in the DHL 2026 E-Commerce Trends Report.
Agentic commerce can be seen as the next step in AI usage evolution. When it comes to adoption, this is in its most advanced form, complete authority for the agent to search for purchases and execute the purchase itself.
On the other hand, you can see searching for products through, for example, ChatGPT as agentic commerce too, just with more manual steps for the user to perform. Cheesewright predicts that agentic commerce will evolve over time to reach more authority.
DHL reports two important sides, both on control and the increase of trust in AI. The better AI tools become, the more willing customers are to use them. About 30% of customers expect they can trust AI more in the near future when it comes to leveraging shopping tasks, with the highest regional percentage being 56% for Sub-Saharan Africa. Customers already using more “hands-free” tools like voice search show a higher willingness; 57% are likely to let AI make shopping decisions for them.
Report at a glance
The DHL 2026 E-Commerce report goes over the trends like the above that both customers and shoppers face in the industry. Both sides have been surveyed across countries, personalities and characteristics, and business sizes.
This post goes over mainly the AI aspects. Nevertheless, the report shows other key findings important to take into account when optimizing your business:
- Cross-border shopping becomes mainstream. Mainly driven by younger, tech-enabled shoppers, the importance of international business is important. Especially in Europe, where being international usually means close, neighboring countries. For example, 63% of Portuguese shoppers buy from Spain. With flexibilities already in place such as the European Union and trade agreements, there exists an opportunity to grow for webshops.
- Cart abandonment due to friction in delivery. 7 in 10 shoppers cancel the purchase if delivery is not as expected. Free shipping and faster delivery are key options to include in your business. In addition, specifically on logistics, the top 3 most important enhancements to both businesses and customers are faster delivery, personalized delivery, and parcel shops / lockers.
- Sustainability is driven by convenience. DHL suggests building it into the experience to make sustainable enhancements not an extra step and hurdle for users. AI is also used to help, with 46% using it and 47% of shopping open to it.
- AI is mainstream for young adults and large, medium, and small businesses. About 38% of shoppers use AI already in their shopping, and 35% of businesses. The youngest generations, Gen Z and Millennials, use AI the most, being 43% and 38% respectively. They are also most open to agentic commerce.
Friction causes cart abandonment
Only a quarter of surveyed shoppers have never abandoned their online shopping journey. Of the large portion of customers that do abandon, the main friction lies in unclear delivery rates. It is good to note that the report shows that other points of friction are also important to look into, such as those regarding the online experience. Of those who abandon their journey, about 50% say it is due to site speed and complexity. About 50% also find product reviews and images important, pointing to this as a driving force.
It is therefore important to optimize interactions with your business on all platforms. Optimize websites with proper SEO and AEO, delivery and payments with options customers actually use, and logistics with automated product re-ordering.
AI is used, and usage will grow
“The real opportunity is to apply it where it can add the most value: tackling fraud and making shopping simpler.”
— DHL Report Summary
AI specifically is widely used by businesses and widely appreciated by users. DHL reports product reviews, virtual assistants, and price comparisons are most experienced by visitors currently. When it comes to features they’d appreciate including in the future, customers would like to see fraud detection, price comparisons, and automated reordering of out-of-stock products to be taken care of by AI.
Similar to SEO improvements, use the data customers give to you to get a clear, full picture of customer behavior. This goes beyond purchases or manually clicking “add to my waiting list”; customers would like this to be done automatically.
AI implementations by businesses are in most cases in line with what customers request. On the business side, personalization is most implemented, followed by virtual assistants and product review. Automated re-ordering is also mentioned, with currently 46% of businesses already using AI for this.
AI use will grow according to the majority of businesses surveyed, and this holds across enterprise sizes and subscription sellers alike.
Trust and openness: AI that is fair, accurate, and respectful
Customer-first AI is important to both shoppers and businesses, a conclusion drawn from how closely shopper and business concerns align. Alongside accuracy and showing the correct results, it is important to have a platform that is privacy-aware, trustworthy, and secure.
While older generations are more hesitant towards AI, only the surveyed baby boomers have a majority that never uses AI when shopping online, a little over half with 56%. Similarly, while those most concerned about AI are mostly European, none of the surveyed countries have a majority of citizens being concerned about AI.
Nevertheless, it is important to make sure AI is trusted and comfortable for both customers and businesses. In addition to the above concerns, overly intrusive personalization, pushy upselling tactics, and biased or unfair pricing need to be taken into account.
Cheesewright also talks about the growth of open-source AI assistants like OpenClaw. Agents like these are inherently more trustworthy, as the actual code and data are publicly available.
This shows that businesses need to make sure their data works well with AI alongside a properly tuned system that harnesses users’ needs the way they see fit. AI that is fair, accurate, and respectful.
Read more on what users find important when using AI in blog post on AI adoption.
Conclusion
Whether it is personalized delivery, AI adoption, or worldwide shipping. Users want shopping to be easy and comfortable. From what we see in the report, while new technologies are helping ecommerce, the customer expectation remains consistent: reduce friction, build trust, and make every step of the shopping journey effortless.
As a business, that means making sure you know your customer well beyond purchase numbers. Know what they look for, but also know what products are missing to adapt to what they expect from you. Knowing who is visiting your website and what concerns they have is equally important, such that you don’t go too far with, for example, pushy upselling and user data use.
Agentic commerce specifically is something that follows these principles quite well. With users visiting your online store via AI agents themselves, it has become even more common to provide and expect a personalized customer experience. This expectation will only increase over time. It is therefore important to make sure you cater to visitors from agents just as well as to direct visitors to provide the best experience for them to evolve into customers.
"In this new era, the winners will be those who move fastest - and translate that speed into superior customer experiences."
The DHL 2026 E-Commerce Trends Report presents the results of a survey for customers and businesses. In total, 29,000 online shoppers were surveyed across generations from baby boomers to Gen Z and with specific characteristics, such as convenience shoppers, hands-free, eco-friendly, and more.
A similar variation is present for businesses, with 5,800 ecommerce surveyed businesses from B2B, B2C, and sizes from sole traders up to large enterprises.
The report talks about ecommerce trends worldwide, with 29 countries surveyed across 6 global regions.
