The Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP) is an open standard for connecting buyers, their AI agents and businesses so that purchases can be completed inside an AI interface. Stripe and OpenAI developed it and announced it on September 29, 2025, together with Instant Checkout in ChatGPT. The code is licensed under Apache 2.0.
At a glance
- Publisher
- OpenAI and Stripe
- Connects
- buyers and their AI agents with businesses and payment providers
- Status
- beta, current version 2026-04-17
- License
- Apache 2.0
- Specification
- Agentic Commerce Protocol (GitHub)
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How does ACP work?
The protocol covers three parties. The agent, such as ChatGPT, talks to the buyer. The merchant exposes checkout endpoints and stays the seller of record. The payment provider issues a limited payment credential. The GitHub specification lists a checkout API, a delegated payment specification, JSON schemas for payloads and events, capability negotiation and an extensions framework.
For payment, Stripe describes a Shared Payment Token. The buyer picks a payment method, Stripe issues the token, the agent passes it to the merchant, and the merchant processes the order through its usual payment flow. Merchants keep control over which orders to accept, taxes and fulfillment. Product discovery relies on a product feed with prices and availability that merchants submit to OpenAI, according to the OpenAI documentation.
The specification uses date-based versions and is marked as beta. OpenAI and Stripe are named as founding maintainers.
Example
A shopper asks ChatGPT for trail running shoes. The agent shows products from merchant feeds. When the shopper decides to buy, the agent calls the merchant’s checkout endpoints and hands over the payment token. The merchant confirms the order and ships it.
Status and context
Instant Checkout, the first ChatGPT feature built on ACP, was scaled back in March 2026, according to reports. According to TechCrunch, OpenAI said the initial version did not offer the flexibility it wanted, and shoppers are now routed to merchant apps or websites for checkout, with ACP remaining in place. OpenAI’s documentation says onboarding product feeds in ChatGPT is currently available to approved partners (as of October 2026). Google’s Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) addresses a similar goal for Google surfaces.
| Protocol | Publisher | Connects | Status and version |
|---|---|---|---|
| MCP (Model Context Protocol) | by Anthropic, since 2025-12-09 at the Agentic AI Foundation (Linux Foundation) | AI applications with servers that provide data, tools and prompts | current version 2026-07-28 |
| A2A (Agent2Agent) | by Google, donated to the Linux Foundation; joining the Agentic AI Foundation announced on 2026-08-27 | AI agents from different vendors with each other | specification 1.0 (release v1.0.1 of 2026-05-28) |
| ACP (Agentic Commerce Protocol) (this term) | OpenAI and Stripe | buyers and their AI agents with businesses and payment providers | beta, current version 2026-04-17 |
| AP2 (Agent Payments Protocol) | Google; standardisation continues in FIDO Alliance working groups | AI agents, merchants and payment providers for payments on behalf of users | v0.2 (release of 2026-04-28) |
| UCP (Universal Commerce Protocol) | Google with commerce partners (incl. Shopify, Etsy, Wayfair, Target, Walmart) | platforms and AI agents with businesses (profile at /.) | stable, version 2026-08-25 |
| WebMCP | W3C Web Machine Learning Community Group (editors from Microsoft and Google) | websites with AI agents in the browser | draft (Draft Community Group Report of 2026-10-02), not a W3C standard; origin trial in Chrome from version 149 |
| NLWeb | Microsoft (announced 2025-05-19), open source under the MIT licence | websites (Schema.org and RSS content) with users and AI agents; every instance is an MCP server | open-source project without a published version number |
Versions and status as stated in each specification or on the publisher's site, checked on 8 October 2026. These protocols change quickly. MCP, ACP and UCP use date-based versions (YYYY-MM-DD), A2A and AP2 use version numbers. Sources: Model Context Protocol: Specification 2026-07-28; Model Context Protocol: Versioning; Anthropic: Donating the Model Context Protocol and establishing the Agentic AI Foundation (2025-12-09); A2A Protocol: Specification; A2A: A new chapter for A2A, joining the Agentic AI Foundation (2026-08-27); A2A releases (GitHub); Agentic Commerce Protocol (GitHub); AP2: Agent Payments Protocol; AP2 releases (GitHub); Universal Commerce Protocol: Specification overview (2026-08-25); Universal Commerce Protocol; WebMCP: Draft Community Group Report (W3C Web Machine Learning CG); Chrome for Developers: WebMCP (updated 2026-10-07); Microsoft: Introducing NLWeb (2025-05-19); NLWeb (GitHub). Last checked: .
Common mistakes
- Assuming ChatGPT access is open. According to OpenAI’s documentation, onboarding product feeds in ChatGPT is currently available to approved partners only (as of October 2026).
- Equating ACP with Instant Checkout. Instant Checkout was the first application. OpenAI scaled the feature back, while ACP stays documented in the developer pages.
- Overlooking the versioning. ACP is marked as beta and uses date-based versions (YYYY-MM-DD). The latest released version is dated 2026-04-17.
FAQ
Is ACP open source? Yes. The repository uses the Apache 2.0 license.
Who maintains ACP? OpenAI and Stripe are the founding maintainers.
Sources
- Developing an open standard for agentic commerce – Stripe (Sep 29, 2025)stripe.com
- agentic-commerce-protocol – GitHubgithub.com
- Agentic Commerce Protocol – OpenAI Developersdevelopers.openai.com
- Stripe powers Instant Checkout in ChatGPT – Stripe Newsroom (Sep 29, 2025)stripe.com
- OpenAI's plans to make ChatGPT more like Amazon aren't going so well – TechCrunch (Mar 24, 2026, secondary)techcrunch.com
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