Amazon pushes Alexa+ deeper into AI-powered shopping
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Amazon's new Alexa for Shopping interface. Photo: Amazon
Amazon is making Alexa a more powerful shopping companion by folding its Rufus assistant into Alexa+.
Why it matters: AI shopping assistants are quickly moving from search boxes to software agents that can track prices, remember preferences, recommend products and eventually make purchases for consumers.
Driving the news: Alexa for Shopping rolls out to U.S. customers Wednesday on the Amazon app, Amazon.com and Echo devices, Rajiv Mehta, Amazon's vice president of conversational shopping, told Axios.
- Customers don't need a Prime membership or Echo device to use it.
- The assistant replaces Rufus, which Amazon launched in 2024 as its AI shopping assistant. More than 300 million customers used Rufus in 2025, Mehta said.
- Customers may need to restart their app or browser session to see the update.
How it works: Amazon wants shopping conversations to follow customers from device to device, cutting down on repeated searches and questions across platforms, Mehta said.
- A customer could brainstorm a child's science fair project with Alexa on an Echo device, then later open the Amazon app and ask for supplies without repeating the full context.
- A shopper researching a laptop in the Amazon app could set a price alert, get notified later through an Echo device when the price drops and ask Alexa to buy the item.
Zoom in: Amazon is putting conversational AI directly into the shopping flow, letting consumers ask questions in the main search bar instead of opening a separate chatbot.
- Alexa for Shopping can generate buying guides, compare products side-by-side and surface AI-generated summaries on search and product pages.
- Amazon also is expanding product price history to a full year.
- Echo Show devices are getting a redesigned shopping experience that looks more like Amazon's app and website, letting customers browse, compare and buy products by voice, touch or both.
What we're watching: Amazon is leaning into "agentic" shopping tools that can act on a customer's behalf.
- Auto-Buy can purchase a product automatically once it hits a target price.
- Scheduled Actions can add items to a cart or surface recommendations for customer review before checkout.
- Alexa for Shopping can also reorder household staples, track prices and alert customers about new products.
Yes, but: The experience relies heavily on Amazon retaining shopping and conversational history across devices.
- Customers can review and manage interactions through the Alexa Privacy Dashboard and ask Alexa what it knows about them.
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