Artificial intelligence, social commerce and hybrid shopping experiences are set to fundamentally reshape the 2026 retail season, with AI chat agents alone expected to account for one-fifth of global ecommerce traffic, according to Salesforce’s 2026 Holiday Predictions report.
The forecast comes as the traditional online shopping journey becomes increasingly fragmented. Salesforce’s Shopping Index data shows global digital traffic grew 18% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2026, while order volume increased by just 1%. Mobile accounted for three-quarters of online traffic, social media drove 29% more ecommerce visits, and cart abandonment stood at 82%.
Against this backdrop, Salesforce expects AI assistants to become a major gateway for product discovery. Consumer reliance on AI assistants as the first stop in the shopping journey increased 200% between May 2025 and May 2026. Half of shoppers now report using an AI assistant at some point during their buying journey, while 74% say they trust product recommendations received through AI chat.
AI reshapes discovery
Salesforce predicts that 20% of all holiday ecommerce traffic in 2026 will originate from AI chat agents, including consumer-facing bots, autonomous agents handling backend tasks and systems scraping competitor information for algorithmic price matching. The shift could force retailers to rethink their approach to visibility, as AI agents increasingly rely on structured product feeds and real-time data rather than conventional web browsing.
The company also expects retailers to accelerate the deployment of their own AI shopping assistants. Salesforce predicts that one in three ecommerce sites will have a site-specific shopper agent live by Cyber Week 2026. Its research found that 41% of shoppers feel “much more confident” about a purchase when a brand-owned AI assistant answers their questions, while retailers using branded AI shopper agents recorded 59% higher holiday sales growth in 2025 than those without them.
Social commerce is expected to be another major growth engine. Salesforce predicts that social commerce will be the fastest-growing transaction channel during the holiday season, expanding at nine times the rate of traditional ecommerce. Purchases through social media rose 17% year-on-year, while Gen Z and Millennials are leading adoption.
Despite the rapid growth of digital channels, physical stores are expected to remain central to holiday shopping. Salesforce says 77% of consumers prefer physical stores for holiday shopping, ahead of online marketplaces at 69%. At the same time, stores are increasingly becoming the final stage of digitally influenced purchases, with 42% of consumers visiting stores to buy products they had already researched online.
Shopping goes hybrid
Salesforce predicts that 38% of holiday retail dollars will come from “hybrid sales”, combining digital research, AI or mobile activity with a physical-store purchase.
The final major trend is economic polarisation. Salesforce describes the 2026 holiday season as a “K-shaped” market in which lower- and middle-income consumers cut spending or trade down while higher-income shoppers remain comparatively resilient. The company expects retailers globally to spend an additional $3 billion subsidising free shipping, a 7% increase from the 2025 holiday season, as logistics costs and returns put further pressure on margins.
Taken together, the predictions point to a holiday season in which retailers will have to manage increasingly fragmented discovery and purchasing journeys while simultaneously serving sharply different consumer groups. The Salesforce forecast suggests that the winning retailers will be those capable of connecting AI, social platforms, ecommerce and physical stores into a single, flexible shopping experience.
