Headlines scream “760% growth” and “AI shopping revolution.” But what do the actual numbers look like? We analysed the latest December 2025 data to separate hype from reality.
The short answer: AI is sending real traffic to ecommerce sites. But Google still sends 300 times more.
The Real Numbers: AI Traffic in December 2025
According to a Conductor study reported by Search Engine Land, AI platforms drive approximately 1% of all web traffic. ChatGPT referral traffic accounts for roughly 0.2% of total sessions.
That 1% has grown seven times since 2024—but from a tiny base. Google still sends 300 times more traffic than all AI platforms combined.
Holiday Season Surge
Adobe reported AI traffic to US retail sites up 760% year-over-year from 1 November to 1 December. Black Friday saw an 805% increase. Cyber Monday was up 670%.
ChatGPT app referrals increased 28% year-over-year over the Black Friday weekend, according to TechCrunch.
These percentages sound massive. But 760% growth on 0.1% traffic share still only gets you to 0.86%. The trend matters. The absolute numbers are still small.
Who’s Getting the AI Traffic?
Big retailers dominate. Digiday reports Amazon captures 54% of ChatGPT referrals, up from 40.5% in 2024. Walmart gets 14.9%, up from 2.7% last year.
ChatGPT now drives 20% of Walmart’s referral traffic. For Target, it’s nearly 15%. Etsy sees over 20% of referral traffic from ChatGPT. eBay sits at approximately 10%.
Among AI platforms, ChatGPT dominates with 87.4% of all AI referral traffic. Perplexity captures 4.1% globally but reaches nearly 20% in the US market. Google Gemini has just 2.6% share but is growing 388% year-over-year. Microsoft Copilot trails at 2.1%.
Does AI Traffic Actually Convert?
The data here is mixed. Some studies show LLM visitors convert 4.4 times better than organic search visitors. But other research tells a different story.
According to Search Engine Land, ChatGPT referrals convert worse than paid search, organic search, affiliate marketing, email, and direct traffic. The only channel ChatGPT beats is paid social media. Affiliate links are 86% more likely to convert than ChatGPT referrals.
The trend is improving though. Conversion rates from ChatGPT are increasing month-over-month. Average order value has declined slightly, but total revenue per session is rising. User intent is evolving as people learn to use AI for shopping.
Putting This in Context
For major retailers, referral clicks account for less than 5% of total site visits. Direct traffic, paid channels, and organic search still dominate.
AI is growing fast but starting from almost nothing. That 760% growth sounds impressive until you remember the baseline. When your starting point is near zero, any increase looks dramatic.
Salesforce data shows generative AI and agents influenced $2 billion in US online sales on Cyber Monday alone. That’s real money. But it’s a fraction of total holiday ecommerce.
What This Means for Your Strategy
Don’t panic. Don’t ignore it either. AI traffic is real and growing, but it’s not replacing Google anytime soon. Treat it as an emerging channel, not the primary one.
Quick Wins for AI Visibility
Focus on structured product data. Clean product feeds and proper schema markup help AI platforms understand your catalogue. Write clear, factual product descriptions that answer the questions shoppers ask.
If you’re on Shopify, enable Agentic Storefronts. This puts your products directly into ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Copilot conversations with minimal setup.
Track AI Referrals in GA4
Set up tracking for AI platform referrals now. Monitor ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini traffic separately. Establish a baseline so you can measure growth over the next year.
Check your referral reports for traffic from chat.openai.com, perplexity.ai, and gemini.google.com. Create a custom channel group to aggregate AI referrals.
ChatGPT shopping features are expanding. Shopify is integrating with major AI platforms. Perplexity already has native checkout. This channel will grow. The question is how fast.
The smart move: optimise for AI discovery while maintaining your SEO fundamentals. Monitor the channel. Don’t bet everything on it yet.
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