Most South Koreans already search on Naver and message on KakaoTalk. Within weeks, both platforms want their AI to start shopping for those users too, replacing the routine of hopping between apps, comparing prices and checking out with a single conversation.
The two companies disclosed concrete launch timelines on back-to-back earnings calls this month.
Naver went first. CEO Choi Soo-yeon told analysts on Feb. 6 that the company's shopping AI agent had reached closed-beta readiness and would begin internal testing immediately, with a public release targeted for late February.
The agent takes natural-language requests, searches across e-commerce platforms for matching products and completes checkout. Ask it for a body lotion in a bigger size with a lighter texture than your last purchase, and it will find options and handle the transaction. Choi said agents for travel and financial services would follow over the course of the year, all housed in a new "AI Tab" coming to Naver's homepage and app in the first half of 2026.
Kakao is taking a different route. Rather than building a standalone shopping tool, the company has embedded an AI agent called "Kanana in KakaoTalk" directly into its messaging app, where it reads conversation context and offers proactive recommendations. If it spots a friend's birthday coming up in a group chat, for instance, it can suggest gifts from KakaoTalk's built-in gifting marketplace.
CEO Chung Shin-a confirmed during Kakao's Feb. 12 earnings call that the service would wrap up its iOS-only beta and launch on both iOS and Android this quarter. Early adoption data was notably strong: more than 80 percent of invited testers completed the required download of an AI model to their device, and roughly 70 percent are still using the service regularly, according to Chung. On March 9, Kakao will fold its existing AI shopping feature into Kanana in KakaoTalk as it consolidates services under a single brand.
One limitation: because the AI runs locally on the phone rather than in the cloud, it currently requires an iPhone 15 Pro or newer, with Android support arriving at full launch.
The two Korean platforms are entering a race that is already well underway globally. OpenAI introduced "Instant Checkout" in ChatGPT last September, letting US users buy from Etsy and Shopify merchants without leaving the chatbot. Google unveiled its Universal Commerce Protocol in January, built with Walmart, Target and Shopify, to enable AI-powered purchases across its search and Gemini interfaces.
Shopping has emerged as the natural entry point for these AI agents because the payoff is measurable. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said last year that customers who used Rufus, the company's shopping AI, were 60 percent more likely to complete a purchase than those who did not.
mjh@heraldcorp.com
