According to research published by Tidio, artificial intelligence now influences approximately half of consumer purchase decisions while simultaneously accounting for less than one percent of tracked web traffic, creating what the report terms a "dark AI" gap in marketing measurement. The findings, detailed in the report AI in E-Commerce in 2026: The New Shopping Funnel, draw on data from over sixty sources including McKinsey, Contentsquare, Similarweb, and Bain, alongside Tidio's own platform data.
The central finding reveals a structural flaw in standard attribution models. McKinsey research indicates half of consumers rely on AI as their primary or preferred source for product research. However, Contentsquare's analysis of actual retail web traffic shows AI-referred sessions represent only 0.2% of total visits. Both figures are accurate, with the discrepancy stemming from consumer behavior: a shopper asks an AI assistant for recommendations, receives a shortlist, and then navigates directly to a brand via a new browser tab or branded search. The resulting session registers as direct or organic traffic, leaving the AI that initiated the journey analytically invisible despite its commercially real influence.
Conversion data from the small fraction of sessions that are tagged as AI-referred suggests this undercounting is substantial. Similarweb's analysis of U.S. retail data finds ChatGPT-referred sessions convert at 11.4%, the highest rate of any measured channel, ahead of direct traffic at 10.2%, paid search at 9.3%, and organic search at 5.3%. This conversion premium implies tagged AI referrals represent a high-intent fraction of a much larger pool of AI-influenced journeys.
The attribution gap is widening, presenting a growing challenge for marketers. TollBit's analysis of AI bot behavior across publisher sites shows click-through rates from AI applications dropped nearly threefold during 2025, from 0.8% in the second quarter to 0.27% by year-end, as AI platforms consume more content while generating proportionally fewer outbound clicks. "Brands making budget decisions based on last-click attribution are optimizing for a measurement system that cannot see what is actually driving demand," said Tytus Gołas, Founder and CEO of Tidio. "The inputs that determine AI visibility - feed completeness, structured data, review coverage - live across multiple teams in most organizations, and no one owns them because no one can see the return."
The financial implications are significant. McKinsey projects $750 billion in U.S. revenue will flow through AI-powered search by 2028, with brands that fail to prepare risking 20 to 50 percent of their traditional search traffic. Morgan Stanley estimates AI agents will influence between $190 billion and $385 billion in U.S. e-commerce spending by 2030. The report also documents emerging protocol infrastructure designed to formalize AI's transactional role, including Google's Universal Commerce Protocol, OpenAI's Agentic Commerce Protocol, and Visa's Trusted Agent Protocol, which create standardized rails for AI agents to complete purchases. Consumer readiness is advancing rapidly; Omnisend research found reluctance to allow AI to complete transactions dropped from 66% to 32% between February and July 2025.
The full report is available for download at https://www.getlyro.ai/reports/ai-in-ecommerce.
