Dive Brief:
- Pinterest launched an experimental artificial intelligence-powered app called Ask Pinterest, according to a Wednesday press release.
- The limited-access app will process natural-language queries from users who are making “multi-step decisions that don’t fit neatly into a single search, like planning a dinner party on a budget,” the company said.
- Pinterest said the new app will retain context across sessions and will “allow us to experiment with the next generation of AI-powered shopping experiences.” In addition, responses will be used to “inform future AI-powered experiences across the main app.”
Dive Insight:
Pinterest sees itself as “an AI-enabled shopping assistant,” according to CEO Bill Ready, who told analysts on a Q2 2025 earnings call that the platform is becoming “a destination for our users to explore their expansive set of commercial journeys.”
The new Ask Pinterest app is the next step in that journey, and comes shortly after the company invested a record $4 billion to deepen its relationship with Amazon Web Services and improve its visual search features.
“As consumer behavior around AI search and discovery evolves, we're creating a new space to rapidly test and learn,” Pinterest said in a statement on Wednesday. “Ask Pinterest is a new experimental app for exploring more conversational, visual-first and agentic shopping experiences.”
The app will work with Pinterest’s taste graph, which is a set of user insights, as well as visual data cues and other proprietary information, “to power more personalized recommendations and inspiration,” per the company.
Last year, the social shopping platform added other AI-powered discovery features, including “make it yours,” which recommends fashion and home products, and “styled for you” and “boards made for you,” which create AI-generated collages and boards.
Users can also shop directly from Pinterest via shoppable “where-to-buy” links, which connect Pins to advertiser websites. On Wednesday, the company also announced several enhanced marketing workflow options in an effort to bring its AI enhancements to advertisers as well as shoppers.
Meanwhile, Pinterest announced plans to cut less than 15% of its workforce and reduce its office space in January as it focuses its resources on AI.
A significant number of major retailers are already placing big bets on agentic AI, with Etsy, Target and Walmart partnering with Google’s Gemini and Microsoft’s Copilot to add their products to external platforms, and working with OpenAI’s ChatGPT to make merchandise available on that platform. Meanwhile, Amazon and Walmart already have proprietary consumer-facing AI assistants.
However, the prevalence of AI has also raised consumer concerns. While 62% of Gen Z and millennials told The Harris Poll and Quad that they would rather use AI-powered tools, seven in 10 of overall respondents said surveillance pricing made them want to shop in stores. Additionally, 73% said they were concerned about how AI would use their personal shopping data.
