Salesforce Confirms AI Agents Hit 20% of Cyber Week Orders—The Tipping Point Has Arrived

Salesforce released its official Cyber Week 2025 data on December 5, and the numbers are staggering: AI agents influenced $67 billion in global sales, representing 20% of all orders. This is no longer a pilot program or a future trend. Agentic commerce has arrived at scale.

TL;DR: Salesforce data confirms AI agents drove $67 billion in Cyber Week sales (20% of all orders). Retailers with AI agents saw 7x higher sales growth (13% vs 2%) compared to those without. The era of optional AI adoption is over.

What Do the Numbers Actually Show?

The Salesforce press release from December 5, 2025 reveals the full scale of AI's impact on holiday shopping. Global Cyber Week sales reached $336.6 billion (up 7% year-over-year), with AI agents influencing one in five purchases.

Here are the critical data points:

• $67 billion in global sales influenced by AI agents
• $13.5 billion in U.S. sales touched by AI (17% of orders)
• 20% of all global orders involved AI assistance
• 805% year-over-year increase in AI-driven traffic on Black Friday

Adobe Analytics confirmed the traffic surge with 670% year-over-year growth in AI traffic on Cyber Monday alone.

Why Is 7x Sales Growth the Number That Matters?

Retailers with AI agents achieved 13% sales growth during Cyber Week. Retailers without them saw just 2%. That 7x advantage represents the clearest evidence yet that AI adoption directly impacts revenue.

Amazon's Rufus chatbot demonstrated this advantage in real time: Black Friday sessions with Rufus saw 100% higher conversion rates compared to sessions without it.

Salesforce's Director of Consumer Insights, Caila Schwartz, stated: "This Cyber Week data confirms a complete shift: AI agents are no longer just a cost-saving measure, but an incredible purchase and productivity accelerator in commerce."

What Should Retailers Do Now?

The data removes any remaining ambiguity. Retailers without AI agent capabilities face a measurable competitive disadvantage. The question is no longer whether to adopt agentic commerce, but how quickly.

Immediate priorities for retailers:

1. Assess protocol readiness: ACP (Stripe/OpenAI) and AP2 (Google/Mastercard) are both live. Support for both ensures maximum reach.
2. Optimize product feeds: 87% of AI agent requests target product pages. Machine-readable, structured data is now table stakes.
3. Enable AI checkout: ChatGPT Instant Checkout is live for Shopify merchants, Etsy sellers, Target, and Walmart. Perplexity supports 6,000+ merchants through BigCommerce, Shopware, and Wix.
4. Track AI referral traffic: ChatGPT referrals to retailer apps increased 28% year-over-year during Black Friday weekend. This channel requires dedicated analytics.

How Does This Change the 2026 Outlook?

SAP Emarsys declared that "2025 will likely be the last year consumers shop as they do now." Forrester predicts one-quarter of shoppers will use specialty retail chatbots by 2026—and warns that three US retail chains will declare bankruptcy in 2026 as those who fail to adapt face existential consequences.

The window for first-mover advantage is closing. As of December 2025:

• 97% of large U.S. retailers used AI for the holiday season
• 42% of consumers already use AI tools for shopping (Harris Poll/Mastercard)
• 33% used AI for holiday shopping specifically, double the rate from 2024

McKinsey projects $1 trillion in U.S. B2C agentic commerce revenue by 2030. The trajectory from $67 billion in a single week to that trillion-dollar milestone is now visible.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is agentic commerce?

Agentic commerce refers to AI agents that autonomously browse, compare, and purchase products on behalf of consumers. Unlike chatbots that answer questions, these agents complete transactions from discovery to checkout without human intervention.

How many orders did AI agents influence during Cyber Week 2025?

According to Salesforce's December 5, 2025 press release, AI agents influenced 20% of all global Cyber Week orders, totaling $67 billion in sales. In the U.S. specifically, AI influenced $13.5 billion (17% of orders).

What sales advantage do retailers with AI agents have?

Salesforce data shows retailers with AI agents achieved 13% sales growth during Cyber Week, compared to just 2% for retailers without agents. This represents a 7x performance advantage.

Which platforms support AI shopping?

As of December 2025, major platforms include ChatGPT (with Instant Checkout for Shopify, Etsy, Target, Walmart), Google (agentic checkout in Search), Amazon Rufus (with Auto Buy), and Perplexity (free AI shopping with 6,000+ merchants).

Conclusion

Cyber Week 2025 marks the tipping point. With $67 billion influenced by AI agents and a 7x sales advantage for equipped retailers, the data eliminates any debate about whether agentic commerce matters. The only question remaining: will you be among the 13% growing, or the 2% falling behind?