Surfaced

Selling on Microsoft Copilot with Shopify: Checkout and Settings

Published

Last checked against Shopify's Help Center and Microsoft's announcement: October 19, 2026.

If you sell to US shoppers on Shopify, your products may already be buyable inside Microsoft Copilot, without you installing anything. This guide explains how that works, who's eligible, which settings control it, and which parts of your normal checkout don't show up in a Copilot purchase, so you can decide whether to keep it on and what to fix first.

Unless another link is given, the facts below come from Shopify's Microsoft Copilot and AI channels with built-in checkout Help Center pages.

How Shopify stores end up in Copilot

Microsoft announced Copilot Checkout on January 8, 2026, rolling out in the US on Copilot.com with PayPal, Shopify and Stripe as partners. Microsoft's post says Shopify merchants are "automatically enrolled following an opt-out window", with no application or integration needed, while PayPal and Stripe merchants apply through a Microsoft form (Microsoft Advertising blog).

On the Shopify side, Copilot is one of the channels in your agentic storefronts (Sales channels > Agentic). Your products reach it through Shopify Catalog, Shopify's structured product feed. If agentic storefronts are new to you, start with our agentic storefronts explainer.

The same Microsoft post notes that joining Microsoft Merchant Center isn't required to sell through Copilot Checkout, though Merchant Center product feeds can help with organic Copilot results.

Eligibility: the four things Shopify checks

Shopify lists these requirements for selling on Microsoft Copilot:

  1. Your store sells to customers in the United States.
  2. Your products are eligible for Shopify Catalog. Catalog has its own store- and product-level rules. We've turned them into a Shopify Catalog requirements checklist.
  3. You've agreed to the Shopify Agentic Storefronts Supplemental Terms of Service.
  4. Your Terms of service, Privacy policy and Return and refund policy are completed under Settings > Policies.

Item 4 is the easiest one to miss. A store with a blank refund policy can look fine on its own site and still fail this check.

To see whether Catalog is picking up your products at all, go to Sales channels > Agentic > Sources > Shopify Catalog. There you'll see either a product count or an Ineligible warning (Shopify Help: Products on agentic storefronts).

What a Copilot purchase looks like

With direct checkout on, a shopper can buy without leaving the chat:

  • They click Buy in Copilot, enter shipping and payment details in a Shopify-powered checkout, and click Pay now. Shopify notes that button wording can vary by AI channel.
  • Payment is by credit or debit card, and only a subset of your accelerated checkout options is supported.
  • Direct checkout is only shown to customers based in the United States.
  • Shopify says there are no extra fees beyond your standard payment processing fees.

The checkout can look different from your online store's, because only the essential checkout blocks load. You still own the customer relationship and the post-purchase experience (Shopify Help: Customer experience).

The settings that control Copilot

Direct checkout is on by default for eligible stores. To change anything for Copilot alone:

  1. In Shopify admin, go to Sales channels > Agentic.
  2. Turn off Allow Shopify to manage for me.
  3. Click Microsoft Copilot.
  4. Adjust the two settings below, then click Save.
SettingIf you turn it off
Shopify Catalog accessProduct data stops being shared with Copilot, but this can take up to 7 days. It doesn't affect Shop or other platforms.
Direct checkoutShoppers can still find your products in Copilot, but they're sent to your online store to buy.

Turning Catalog access off doesn't guarantee your products disappear: Shopify warns they can still show up through other methods such as web crawling. To fully hide a single product from AI channels, Shopify points to setting its status to Unlisted. That also removes it from your sitemap, search engines like Google, and your store's own search, so only use it for products you really want hidden (Shopify Help: Products on agentic storefronts).

What doesn't carry over into Copilot checkout

This is the part worth reading before you decide anything. Shopify lists these limits for direct checkout in AI channels:

Products that can't be bought in direct checkout

  • Subscriptions
  • Product bundles
  • Customizable products
  • B2B-only products

Delivery methods that aren't offered

  • Local delivery, pickup in store and pickup points

Checkout customizations that may not appear

Only checkout extensions with checkout blocking enabled may load, and even those might not show. Blocks that are generally unavailable include ones that change cart contents, add upsells or surcharges, handle loyalty, autocomplete addresses, collect consent, show chat, sit in the header, footer or payment section, or show informational text.

Tracking

Google Analytics and custom pixels don't fire in direct checkout. Only server-to-server checkout started and completed events are sent.

Accounts

You can't require shoppers to sign in before checkout.

What is supported

Shipping, discount and cart/checkout validation Shopify Functions run, and both automatic discounts and discount codes work.

A practical checklist

Work through this in order.

  1. Confirm the basics. Open Settings > Policies and make sure Terms of service, Privacy policy and Return and refund policy all have real content. Check that the US is in your selling markets.
  2. Check Catalog status. In Sales channels > Agentic > Sources > Shopify Catalog, look for a product count, not Ineligible. If products are missing, work through the Catalog requirements checklist.
  3. Move legal disclosures up. Shopify asks that required legal disclosures appear within the first 6,000 characters of the product description. If you sell anything with warnings (for example, ingredient or safety notices) buried at the bottom of a long description, move them higher.
  4. Decide per product type. If most of your revenue comes from subscriptions, bundles or made-to-order personalized items, those can't be bought through Copilot's direct checkout anyway. You may prefer to leave direct checkout on for the rest of the catalog, or turn it off so every Copilot shopper lands on your own store. Both are valid; it's your call.
  5. Check your checkout extensions. List the checkout blocks you rely on (upsells, loyalty, gift messages, consent checkboxes) and assume they won't show in Copilot. If one of them is legally required for your business, talk to the app's developer or turn direct checkout off.
  6. Fix your attribution blind spot. Because GA4 and custom pixels don't fire in direct checkout, Copilot orders won't show up the way your web orders do in analytics tools. Use Shopify's own reports for these. Our guide on tracking ChatGPT and Copilot sales in Shopify covers the built-in options.
  7. Improve how products show up. Copilot can only recommend what it understands. Clear titles, complete descriptions, a product category and barcodes (GTINs) where they exist all help Catalog describe your products. Use the listing quality meter and search preview to see where you stand.

Where Surfaced fits

Most of the checklist above is settings you change once. The product data part is ongoing: every new product needs a category, alt text, barcodes where they exist and a description an assistant can match. The free AI readiness checker scans a public Shopify store and shows which of those gaps exist. The Surfaced app does the same inside your admin, applies the safe fixes with undo, and attributes AI-referred sales.

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