Answers the question: How do ChatGPT, Gemini and other AI assistants get information about my Shopify products?
Route 1: Shopify Catalog
Shopify describes Catalog as the primary way its AI channels receive your product data. It lists each product with its title, description, options, images, price, availability and other attributes. Assistants such as ChatGPT, Google AI Mode and Gemini, Microsoft Copilot and Meta read it, and checkout then runs on Shopify’s own rails or at your store’s checkout.
What this route needs is complete, accurate product data in your admin, published policies, and the right settings under Sales channels and then Agentic.
Route 2: the open web
Other agents and crawlers read the public pages of your store: your product pages, the markup behind them, robots.txt and your sitemap. Since 5 August 2026, Shopify also exposes WebMCP tools on every Liquid storefront, so an AI agent running in a shopper’s browser can search your catalogue and use the cart. The agent has to visit your store first, so this does not bring you new shoppers by itself.
What this route needs is crawlers that can reach your pages, product markup that states price, availability and the other facts, and descriptions written so that a piece of text makes sense on its own.
The two routes side by side
| Route 1: Shopify Catalog | Route 2: the open web | |
|---|---|---|
| Who reads it | Shopify’s AI channels | Crawlers and browser agents |
| What they read | Product data from your admin | Your public pages and markup |
| What helps most | Clear titles, descriptions, options, images and policies | Crawl access, product markup and readable text |
| Where you manage it | Sales channels, then Agentic | Your theme, apps and robots.txt |
Which route matters more?
For Shopify’s own channels, Route 1. For every other agent, Route 2. Because you cannot tell in advance which assistant a shopper will use, the safe approach is to do both: write clear product data, and make sure your public pages are readable too.
Common mistakes
- Thinking markup in your theme controls what Shopify’s channels see. Catalog is built from your product data.
- Blocking AI crawlers and assuming your products have disappeared from every assistant. Shopify says blocking crawlers affects only open-web discoverability, and does not stop Catalog sending your data.
- Showing ratings only through a widget that loads with JavaScript, so crawlers that do not run it never see them.
Frequently asked questions
- Does blocking AI crawlers stop my products reaching ChatGPT through Shopify?
- According to Shopify, blocking crawlers in robots.txt or at the network layer affects only open-web discoverability. It does not stop Shopify Catalog sending your product data to the agentic channels.
- What is WebMCP?
- It is a way for a website to offer tools, such as search and cart actions, to an AI agent in the shopper’s browser. Shopify switched it on for every Liquid storefront on 5 August 2026, with nothing to install.
- Do I need to do anything for the open web route?
- Check that crawlers can reach your pages, that your product pages state price and availability in markup, and that your product descriptions say what the product is.