TikTok Unveils Buy Direct and an AI Shopping Assistant in the US: How Brands Can Sell In-App Without TikTok Shop
TikTok launched Buy Direct, a one-click in-app checkout straight from brands, and Shopping Assistant, a conversational AI agent. We explain how it differs from TikTok Shop, how UCP and merchant-of-record status work, and which terms remain undisclosed.
Key Takeaways
- On October 5, 2026, TikTok announced Buy Direct, which lets US shoppers buy from a brand with one click from the For You feed, and Shopping Assistant, a conversational AI agent. Built with Salesforce, Shopify, Shoplazza, Stripe and others, they are the first of several agentic commerce experiences
- Buy Direct is separate from TikTok Shop. The brand remains the merchant of record, and its own systems process the order through UCP (Universal Commerce Protocol). Purchases can now be completed inside the app without listing on TikTok Shop
- For e-commerce brands, UCP support and well-maintained product data become the new conditions for selling inside TikTok. Fees and merchant eligibility criteria are undisclosed, and the features are currently in eligibility-based testing
TikTok's first step into "agentic commerce"
At Advertising Week New York 2026, we're unveiling agentic solutions across every stage of the customer journey and expanding creative potential both on-and-off the platform.
newsroom.tiktok.comSee a product in a video, want it, and buy it straight from the brand without leaving TikTok. On October 5, timed to Advertising Week New York 2026, TikTok announced two features designed to make that happen.
Buy Direct is an in-app checkout that lets users buy a brand's product with one click from the For You feed (the app's main, algorithm-driven video feed). Shopping Assistant is a conversational AI agent that understands context and remembers user needs, answering questions about product details, shipping, sizing and availability.
TikTok describes the pair as the first of several agentic commerce experiences it plans to roll out. Commerce platforms and payment providers including Salesforce, Shopify, Shoplazza and Stripe are building with it. According to Adweek, both features began rolling out to users and brands in the US on the day of the announcement.
That does not mean every brand can use them right away. TikTok's advertiser blog says these agentic solutions are available through eligibility-based testing opportunities, and asks interested advertisers to contact their TikTok sales partner.
How a purchase path outside TikTok Shop works
The most consequential point in the announcement is that Buy Direct is a separate mechanism from TikTok Shop.
TikTok Shop, launched in the US in September 2023, is a marketplace run by TikTok. According to a TechCrunch article (syndicated on Yahoo Tech), eMarketer estimates TikTok Shop generated about $15.8 billion in US sales in 2025, roughly 18% of all US social commerce. Selling on TikTok has mostly meant opening a TikTok Shop, but the article frames the new features as extending shopping across the broader app, including the For You feed.
With Buy Direct, the brand's own systems process the order. The advertiser blog says Buy Direct includes one-click purchase using stored payment methods and saved addresses, seamless loading and in-app order tracking. On top of that, the brand remains the merchant of record for the transaction. The merchant of record is the business legally responsible as the seller, including for payment, returns and customer service.
The technical foundation is UCP (Universal Commerce Protocol), the open standard led by Google. TikTok states that Buy Direct requires a UCP integration and describes UCP as a standardized set of rules that enables AI agents and merchant systems to work together. The UCP Tech Council includes 10 companies such as Salesforce, Stripe and Meta, and TikTok has now joined as a platform that uses the standard.
Salesforce's announcement spells out what this means for merchants. Even though the transaction happens on TikTok, merchants can capture the shopper's contact information and purchase history, handle customer service and returns themselves, and follow up by email to drive repeat purchases. A sale made inside TikTok still leaves the shopper as the brand's customer.
Here is how the three ways of selling compare.
| Item | TikTok Shop | Buy Direct | Ads linking to an external site |
|---|---|---|---|
| How you sell | List on a marketplace run by TikTok | Sell in-app while the brand remains merchant of record | Drive traffic to the brand's own store |
| Where the purchase completes | Inside the TikTok app | Inside the TikTok app (the brand's systems process the order via UCP) | The brand's website |
| Merchant setup | Open a shop and list products | UCP integration (through partners such as Salesforce, Shopify, Shoplazza and Stripe) | Prepare ads and landing pages |
| Fees | Referral fee (9% per order in the UK) | Undisclosed | Ad spend |
| Availability | Available | Eligibility-based testing in the US | Available |
For brands, this creates an option to plug their own checkout into TikTok, separate from listing on TikTok Shop. Salesforce notes that when TikTok catalog, inventory and order data live separately from the rest of the commerce stack, teams end up reconciling numbers by hand, and stockouts or pricing mismatches slip through. Because Buy Direct uses the brand's own inventory and order systems, it offers the most to brands that already run their own store on Shopify or Salesforce Commerce Cloud and want to own their customer data.
Where does Shopping Assistant get its product information?
TikTok's advertiser blog uses the example of someone who sees an ad for hiking boots and wants to know about the material, fit and color options. Shopping Assistant opens a chat window on the product page in TikTok's in-app browser and answers based on information provided by the merchant. From there, the shopper can continue to checkout on the merchant's site.
Reporting by the UK's The Media Leader describes the current scope in more detail. The assistant draws only on the product detail page, including product reviews and basic information. It does not currently find alternative products or make recommendations in response to more general queries, and it cannot complete transactions on behalf of consumers. Kris Boger, TikTok's general manager of global business solutions in the UK, said the current product slate does not include agentic purchasing and that the human remains in control.
TikTok's newsroom post, by contrast, describes guidance through to purchasing within one conversation, so there is a gap between the picture in the announcement and what is offered today.
Salesforce also says it will give enterprise brands a central place to send their catalog to support Shopping Assistant. In other words, the quality of the AI's answers depends almost entirely on the quality of the product data the merchant provides. If size charts, materials, delivery times and stock levels are not accurate, the assistant either cannot answer or answers incorrectly.
Implementation runs through partners, with Salesforce starting in Q1 2027
The realistic path for brands to use Buy Direct is through UCP-capable partners such as Salesforce, Shopify, Shoplazza and Stripe, the companies TikTok named.
So far, only Salesforce has given a timeline. The company says the phased rollout of the new UCP-powered experiences is expected to begin in Q1 2027, and its native TikTok Shop integration through Commerce Connect is slated for general availability in January 2027. It says the UCP checkout is agnostic to the payment provider and order management system.
Which features Shopify, Shoplazza and Stripe will provide, and on what terms, is undisclosed in the sources reviewed for this article. In September, Shopify announced agentic checkout with Shop Pay for Meta's AI agent Muse, and whether it will support TikTok in a similar way is the next thing to watch.
Buy Direct as an ad product
It is easy to miss that this announcement was part of TikTok's updates for advertisers. The same release introduced Agentic Leads, an AI agent for lead generation, and brought the TikTok Ad Network, which reaches about 400,000 apps worldwide, to US advertisers.
Salesforce refers to the integration as TikTok's Buy Direct ads, explaining that the experiences can be delivered through ads with embedded buy buttons and that conversion data flows back into Commerce Cloud to optimize marketing spend. For now, Buy Direct appears to be designed as a purchase path used in combination with advertising.
What remains undisclosed, and reasons for caution
Many of the terms are still blank. Fees and pricing for Buy Direct are undisclosed, so it cannot be compared with TikTok Shop's referral fees. Eligibility criteria for merchants and the full set of touchpoints where Shopping Assistant will appear have not been disclosed either. The Media Leader reports that in-app checkout is US-only for now with a global rollout planned in the coming months, but no specific countries, including Japan, have been named.
TikTok's own incentives deserve attention. The Media Leader notes that TikTok charges sellers a 9% commission on TikTok Shop orders in the UK, giving the company a strong incentive to have purchases completed inside the app rather than elsewhere. Even if brands keep merchant-of-record status under Buy Direct, control over the point of purchase and the experience shifts toward TikTok. TechCrunch also reads the move as an effort to keep users from turning to outside AI tools like ChatGPT.
There is no commitment about the future, either. Asked whether TikTok wants to keep the human in control, Boger said he would not make guarantees about the company's product direction.
The business environment is also changing. As Marketing Dive reports, TikTok's US business began operating under a US joint venture earlier this year. The same article notes that rival Meta's AI agent Muse has quickly gained traction while raising fresh privacy concerns. Placing an AI that remembers user needs at the customer touchpoint brings accountability for brands as well.
Attempts to complete checkout inside an app have not gone smoothly elsewhere. OpenAI ended Instant Checkout, which let users complete purchases inside ChatGPT, in March 2026, and Walmart revealed that its conversion rate was about one-third of its own website's. TikTok, already used as a place to shop, is in a different position, but whether one-click purchase actually lifts conversion will depend on test results.
What e-commerce brands can check now
Brands that run their own online store in the US, or that sell into the US from Japan and elsewhere, can prepare now. Confirm whether your commerce platform or payment provider supports UCP and how it plans to offer the TikTok integration. Then make sure the details Shopping Assistant answers about, such as sizing, materials, delivery times and stock, are complete on product pages and in feeds.
Merchants already on TikTok Shop should be ready to compare their current economics, including fees and affiliate costs, with Buy Direct once its terms are disclosed. The value of owning customer data belongs in that comparison too.
Conclusion
Buy Direct and Shopping Assistant broaden how brands can sell on TikTok beyond the single option of opening a TikTok Shop. Brands can place their own checkout inside TikTok through UCP while keeping their seller status and customer data.
For now, though, the features are in testing, and fees and eligibility are undisclosed. Salesforce's Q1 2027 timeline, what Shopify and Stripe will offer, and how far Shopping Assistant extends beyond the product page are the points to watch. Having called this a first step, what TikTok does next will help define where social commerce ends and agentic commerce begins.
