The key facts
- Amazon launched shopping via text messages with Alexa for select US customers; everyone else can join a waitlist
- The launch follows Meta Muse being blocked from making requests to the Amazon website in September
- The agent can search for products, compare prices, manage lists, and recognize photos of items
Shopping via SMS
Amazon announced on Friday the launch of a feature, allowing customers to interact with the Alexa AI agent via text messages for shopping assistance — modeled on interactions with agents like Muse or Instinct. Selected US users will receive an invitation to enable the feature; those with access will be able to search for products, add them to the cart, and make purchases on Amazon using natural language requests. Everyone else can join a waitlist, with a broader rollout expected in the coming weeks.
What the text agent can do
The feature builds on recent Alexa updates, focused on shopping: the agent manages lists, tracks prices, searches for products across the internet, compares items, and checks order status. You can send a photo of an object or a person in an outfit to find similar products on Amazon. Over time, Alexa will learn users' preferences and suggest products accordingly.
Context: the Muse block and the agent market
The launch came after Amazon blocked Meta's Muse agent in September from making requests on its website, and is timed to the start of the holiday shopping season. According to TechCrunch, platforms are building their own agents amid rapid growth in the consumer AI agent market: in October, DoorDash reported that third-party agents had placed a total of only a few hundred orderson its platform, and the company intends to develop its own text agent, launched in September.
