Shopify shares compare-at prices with AI shopping agents

Shopify Catalog can now send a product’s compare-at price to AI shopping agents, giving them a reference price alongside the current selling price. Shopify announced the change on 9 October; previously, agents reading Catalog received only the current price.

For merchants preparing Black Friday offers, this creates a useful reason to check the pricing data leaving the store. Sharing a reference price does not guarantee that a particular assistant will display a crossed-out price or describe the product as a bargain.

Check your store’s sharing setting

Shopify’s instructions place the control in Sales channels → Agentic. Expand Shopify Catalog under Sources, choose Review product data mapping, then use the switch in the Compare-at section and save.

The Preview tab lets you select a product and inspect its pricing presentation. Shopify cautions that this preview does not reproduce exactly what every AI channel will show, and mapping changes can take time to process.

When the reference price is included

The developer announcement says sharing starts enabled for most stores, but disabled for stores using compare-at prices as MSRP or another reference value. An eligible price must exceed the current price in the buyer’s context. Regional visibility also applies: stores hiding compare-at prices from EEA buyers do not return them for those buyers.

Developers receive the optional list_price field on variants and list_price_range on products. The existing price field is unchanged. A missing list_price means no reference price is available for that buyer and configuration; it should not be interpreted as zero.

A practical check before a promotion

Our recommendation is to sample your highest-traffic products and their variants. Confirm that each reference price means what you intend, compare the Catalog preview with the storefront, and check a real shopping response after changes have had time to propagate.

Keep a record of the setting and the products checked. If your business switches from sale comparisons to recommended retail prices, review the sharing choice again rather than assuming the original default remains appropriate.

Image: Shopify’s official developer-site brand illustration, not a screenshot of the new control.