Mastercard introduced Agent Connect and expanded its Agent Suite for Merchants on September 9, 2026, connecting businesses with AI agents, commerce platforms and payment providers. The announcement builds on the company’s earlier AI payment initiatives, including Agent Pay, Verifiable Intent and partnerships supporting machine payments.
Agent Connect allows merchants to participate in AI-assisted shopping without creating separate technical connections for every AI platform. AI agents can search merchant products, assemble carts, and take shoppers toward payment, with purchases requiring customer authorization before completion.
The service also uses existing merchant catalogs for prices, product descriptions, and stock information. Mastercard said businesses retain control over branding, pricing and customer relationships while their products become available through AI-assisted shopping experiences.
Agent Suite Adds Shopping and Payment Services
Agent Connect sits within Mastercard’s Agent Suite for Merchants, which supports product searches, comparisons, recommendations and checkout through merchant-controlled digital channels. The suite also supports order tracking, refunds, and returns, connecting more parts of the shopping process.
Mastercard is working with Anthropic on commerce tools that use the company’s commerce agent blueprint with Claude models and Mastercard payment capabilities. These tools allow businesses to build shopping agents while keeping control over their digital storefronts and customer interactions.
Mastercard Chief Product Officer Jorn Lambert said, “AI agents will change the buying interface again.” He said Mastercard wants businesses to retain control as AI changes online shopping. Agent Pay adds payment controls by recording customer permission through tokenized authorization.
Mastercard Builds on Earlier AI Payment Initiatives
On April 29, 2025, Mastercard launched Agent Pay and announced work with Microsoft and other leading AI platforms. The initiative uses tokenized credentials to support shopping and payments through AI agents while giving consumers and merchants greater control over transactions.
On March 5, 2026, Mastercard partnered with Google to develop Verifiable Intent, a standards-based trust layer for AI commerce. The system creates a tamper-resistant record of customer authorization, helping participants verify that an AI agent follows approved instructions.
On June 10, 2026, Mastercard announced partnerships with more than 30 companies, including Coinbase, Stripe, Cloudflare, Adyen and Ant International, for Agent Pay for Machines. The initiative supports permissioned machine payments, automated transactions, and microtransactions between AI agents and digital services.
