AI in retail: How AI agents are revolutionizing retail customer service

In the fast-paced world of retail, the customer experience (CX) is everything. Savvy consumers today expect the same personalized experience online as they would receive from a human sales associate in person. This means retailers must deliver hyper-personalized experiences across digital channels, all without overwhelming their human customer service teams.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the perfect fit for retail CX.

The retail industry has aggressively embraced the use of AI for CX. In Metrigy’s AI for Business Success: 2025-26 global research study, 78.6% of participating retailers are already using AI for customer interactions. This isn't just a handful of pilot programs, either; 51.8% of respondents characterize their use of AI as extensive. AI's power to deliver the fast, low-effort experience customers demand, driving brand loyalty and a competitive edge, is fueling this adoption.

Virtual AI agents are a driving force behind this CX revolution in retail. They operate as tireless, 24/7 virtual sales associates, providing instant support, guidance, and personalized recommendations across the entire shopping journey. Already, nearly 70% of retailers are utilizing AI text agents, and 50% are using AI voice agents. Within a year, we can expect nearly all retailers to use virtual AI agents of both types to assist customers, based on the expected adoption details shared in the study.

Already, virtual AI agents are enabling retailers to resolve one-third of contact center interactions without live agent support. Here are three ways they do so as they also transform the retail experience:

AI agents replicate the in-store service of a human sales associate to help customers navigate online product catalogs. They analyze a customer's browsing history, past purchases, and conversational input to personalize product recommendations, complete outfits, or suggest complementary go-along items. For example, AI agents can act as virtual stylists or gift finders, guiding a customer through natural language questions ("What is the event? Who are you buying the gift for?") to provide highly tailored ideas. They also facilitate complex search and filtering, allowing customers to use natural language (text or voice) to locate products that meet specific criteria (e.g., "Show me black patent-leather pumps with a two-inch heel that cost no more than $100.").

The volume of post-purchase questions — especially during peak seasons — can overwhelm human teams. AI agents handle tasks such as order management, returns, and exchanges quickly and precisely. Overall, our research shows that AI successfully resolves one-third of contact center interactions without needing live agent support.

Many retailers are actively engaging AI in the sales funnel to boost conversion rates. For example, AI agents can facilitate recovery of abandoned shopping carts, sending personalized messages that offer help or a targeted discount to encourage purchase completion. Additionally, they can generate and qualify leads by engaging with website visitors to capture their intent and necessary information, then seamlessly hand them off to a human agent. In some cases, AI agents can assist customers in checking out and completing their purchases without requiring them to leave the chat or voice interface.

Already, retail organizations are seeing their AI investments yielding clear, quantifiable returns. Nearly 60% of retailers studied report seeing a positive return on investment (ROI) from AI, with another 15.1% expecting to achieve ROI within the next 12 months. What’s more, ROI begets more spending on AI: Retailers spent 19.2% more on AI, on average, in 2025 as they did in 2024, and are projecting spending to increase by 21.1% in 2026. Their continued budgetary commitment demonstrates that AI — which 77.8% of retailers believe improves their ability to innovate — remains a strategic priority.

To manage and maximize their AI investment, many retailers have or are planning to assemble a centralized strategy group, i.e., an AI Center of Excellence (CoE). Among retail companies, 39.3% already have an AI CoE, and most others (55.4%) are planning one.

Metrigy considers the AI CoE to be essential for ensuring AI’s usefulness across an organization, bringing together a cross-functional group of employees to provide expertise, best practices, training, and guidance for AI decisions. The team tracks technology innovations and their applications to the company, aiming to gain efficiencies and drive additional business metrics, including revenue, profitability, and customer satisfaction. For example, what one product line learns from using virtual AI agents, others may benefit from.

As retailers assess AI’s impact on CX, most are indeed finding positive improvements across these core business metrics. As shown below, at least half of the retail companies in this study have benefited from AI’s use, with customer satisfaction (CSAT) being the most affected metric:

1. 66% are measuring CSAT, with a 24.6% average increase
2. 54.7% are measuring operational costs, with a 16.5% average decrease
3. 54.7% are measuring employee productivity, with a 28.3% average boost
4. 50.9% are measuring sales, with a 25.3% average gain

Furthermore, generative AI (GenAI) is already accelerating deployment for many, with 43% of retailers reporting that GenAI has been a "game changer."

Already, 43% of retailers consider that the successful use of generative AI has accelerated their AI deployment. Just as many say it has had some positive impact, slightly accelerating their AI deployments. For retailers, generative AI-powered virtual agents can improve customer service by delivering interaction summaries, such as exchange details, or detailed product descriptions customized to a buyer’s wish list. 

Beyond generative AI is agentic AI, which operates autonomously to achieve goals, rather than waiting for functional, task-specific prompts. Retailers that use agentic AI already report it being the top contributor to improving CSAT, with two-thirds of retailers rating it as the metric most positively affected. 

Agentic AI could enable virtual AI agents to handle a complex return process from start to finish on their own or negotiate with vendors on behalf of procurement. For the retail industry, focusing on agentic AI means pushing AI beyond simple customer service functions to enable adaptive decision-making across sales, operations, and customer support.

By leveraging virtual agents and other forms of AI, retailers are successfully creating a future in which every customer interaction can be high-impact, low-effort, and perfectly personalized.

Zoom Virtual Agent, powered by agentic AI, can make every self-service interaction feel more personal, helpful, and natural, even without direct human intervention. Get a personalized Zoom Virtual Agent demo or another Zoom CX product demo and see how quickly you can go live.