Editions '26: Catalog API is live

Hey,

Wanted to share something while things are quiet. Been digging into the Shopify Editions '26 stuff.

Your products can now show up in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Copilot through Shopify's Catalog API.

From their docs: Agents can query all eligible Shopify merchants, apply relevant filters, and display results in interactive product cards directly in the chat. https://shopify.dev/docs/agents

This is live now. Here's what ChatGPT shopping looks like in action:

Shopify is connected the same way.

But showing up isn't automatic. ChatGPT doesn't crawl your site - Shopify sends your product data directly through something called the Catalog API.

What gets sent:

For the technical folks: Shopify exposed an MCP endpoint on every store. That's what AI agents query. It's not a page you can visit - it's an API endpoint that responds to MCP protocol requests.

Here's an example of why this matters for a skincare brand:

There’s this one moisturizer on two different stores, with different product descriptions.

Store A: "Hydrating formula for beautiful, healthy-looking skin"

Store B: "Hydrating moisturizer, 2oz, for dry and sensitive skin, fragrance-free, non-comedogenic"

When someone searches "moisturizer for sensitive skin."

Store A: invisible

Store B: shows up

It’s the same product, different product info, and different result.

Two things determine if you show up:

Discovery - can AI find you?
This is where Store A failed - no attributes for AI to match.

Checkout - can customers buy through ChatGPT?
This is based on policy pages, variant data, inventory. If your policies aren't complete, you show up but can't sell.

Apparel, home, footwear all have their own attributes.

You can run your audit again to see how you’re doing: https://gpt.atomz.ai

If you have someone who handles your product data or SEO, worth looping them in on this.

– Ankit