What is Rufus on Amazon? Alexa for Shopping

If you sell on Amazon, a growing share of your shoppers ask Amazon’s AI assistant about the products they consider. That assistant used to be called Rufus. Since May 2026 it is Alexa for Shopping. This guide explains what it is, what it reads from your listings, what you as a seller can and cannot control, and how Buy for Me reaches brands that do not sell on Amazon at all. Every fact here comes from Amazon’s own pages.

What is Rufus on Amazon?

Rufus was Amazon’s generative AI shopping assistant, launched in beta in February 2024 and opened to all US customers that July. It answered shopping questions inside the Amazon app and website. On May 13, 2026, Amazon brought Rufus and Alexa+ together and renamed it Alexa for Shopping.

Amazon announced Rufus in February 2024 as a conversational shopping experience, launching to a small subset of US customers. By July it was available to all US customers in the Amazon Shopping app and on desktop. It reached the UK in September 2024, and opened in beta in Germany, France, Italy and Spain on October 29, 2024.

The scale is large. In its fourth quarter 2025 results, Amazon said Rufus was used by more than 300 million customers in 2025 and drove nearly $12 billion in incremental annualized sales. In the third quarter, it said shoppers using Rufus were 60% more likely to complete a purchase.

Here is how the assistant got to where it is, as Amazon reported it:

From Rufus to Alexa for Shopping, as Amazon announced it

1. 1 February 2024

   Rufus launches in beta to a small subset of US customers in the Amazon Shopping app.

2. 2 July 2024

   Rufus becomes available to all US customers in the Amazon Shopping app and on desktop.

3. 3 Fall 2024

   Rufus reaches the UK in September, then opens in beta in Germany, France, Italy and Spain on October 29.

4. 4 April 2025

   Amazon starts testing Buy for Me, which buys from other brands' websites for US shoppers.

5. 5 2025 results

   Amazon reports more than 300 million customers used Rufus in 2025, with nearly $12 billion in incremental annualized sales.

6. 6 March 2026

   Amazon opens Shop Direct to all US customers and lets merchants send product data through feed providers.

7. 7 March 2026

   Amazon Ads announces sponsored prompts, ads that can open a dialog in Rufus, for general availability in the US on March 25.

8. 8 May 13, 2026

   Amazon brings Rufus and Alexa+ together as Alexa for Shopping, rolling out to all US customers over the following week.

Did Amazon discontinue Rufus?

No, it was renamed. On May 13, 2026, Amazon brought Rufus and Alexa+ together into Alexa for Shopping. The assistant still works inside the Amazon app and website for US customers, with more features, and older Amazon articles about Rufus now carry a note about the new name.

Amazon’s announcement of Alexa for Shopping says it is available to US customers on the Amazon Shopping app and website, and also on Echo Show devices. No Echo device, Alexa app or Prime membership is required. Questions that are not about shopping are handed to Alexa+ on the Alexa app or Alexa.com.

We found no Amazon page launching Alexa for Shopping outside the US. If you sell in the UK, Germany, France, Italy or Spain, the assistant your shoppers see may still carry the Rufus name.

For sellers, Amazon’s announcement describes no change to the listing data the assistant reads. What it adds is memory shared between Amazon and Alexa, a full year of price history where Rufus showed 30 and 90 days, and the assistant on Echo Show.

What does Alexa for Shopping do?

It answers shopping questions in the Amazon search bar, compares products, writes AI overviews at the top of search results and on product pages, shows up to a year of price history, sets price alerts, buys at a set price, schedules routine purchases and can buy from other brands’ websites.

Amazon lists these features in its announcement:

• Questions in the search bar. Shoppers ask directly in the main Amazon search bar.
• Comparisons and shopping guides. It generates product comparisons and custom guides that weigh features, prices and reviews.
• AI overviews. Summaries at the top of search results and on product detail pages.
• Price tools. Up to a full year of price history, price alerts and Auto Buy at a set price.
• Routine purchases. Scheduled purchases and reorders from past orders.
• Memory. It remembers each shopper’s preferences, past purchases and conversations across Amazon and Alexa.
• Buy for Me. It can complete purchases on other brands’ websites (covered below).

The overview on your product page is the part to watch. It summarizes your product in Amazon’s words on your own detail page, and Amazon does not say which parts of your listing and reviews it draws on.

Amazon reports the assistant keeps growing. In its second quarter 2026 results, Amazon said active users worldwide were close to doubling year over year, and that in the US, customers who use Alexa for Shopping spend an average of over 40% more per order than customers who do not.

How does Rufus work?

It answers from Amazon’s product catalog, customer reviews, community Q&A and information from across the web. On a product page, it answers from that product’s listing details, reviews and Q&A. Amazon says it retrieves this information at answer time and learns from shoppers’ feedback on its answers.

Amazon’s launch post says Rufus was trained on the product catalog, customer reviews, community Q&As and information from across the web. On a product page, its answers draw on listing details, customer reviews and community Q&As.

Amazon Science describes the system in more detail. It retrieves from customer reviews, the product catalog and community questions and answers, calls Amazon’s store systems for current data, and improves through reinforcement learning from shoppers’ feedback on whether they liked an answer.

In November 2025 Amazon added more. Its feature update says the assistant is built on Amazon Bedrock and uses several models, among them Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet and Amazon Nova. It also retrieves from publishers such as The New York Times, USA Today, Good Housekeeping and Vogue, and keeps expanding a knowledge graph of product attributes and customer preferences.

So three sources shape what the assistant says about your product:

1. Your listing. Title, bullets, description, attributes and other listing details.
2. Your customers. Reviews and community Q&A.
3. The wider web. Articles and reviews published outside Amazon.

What can sellers control in Alexa for Shopping?

Sellers control their listing details, which the assistant reads, and their ads, which can appear inside it. Amazon advises answering frequent questions in product descriptions and keeping structured fields complete. Sponsored ads are eligible to serve in Alexa for Shopping, and sponsored prompts are enrolled automatically.

Your listing. Amazon’s own seller blog, in April 2026, says Rufus can search through product details, reviews and Q&A content, and advises making sure product descriptions address frequently asked questions. In practice that means:

• State what the product is, who it is for and what it is not, in plain words.
• Fill every relevant attribute and compatibility field, not only the required ones.
• Answer the questions buyers ask most, in the description or bullets.
• Keep claims accurate. The assistant repeats what your page says.

Your ads. Amazon Ads says existing sponsored ads campaigns are automatically eligible to serve in Alexa for Shopping. Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands prompts, which can open a dialog in the assistant, were announced for general availability in the US on March 25, 2026. Campaigns are enrolled automatically, and advertisers can pause a prompt in the Ads Console. Amazon has also announced Branded Conversations, marked as sponsored inside Alexa for Shopping, for launch in the US in January 2027.

What you cannot do. We found no Amazon help page that lets a seller remove a product from the assistant’s answers, or that lists exactly how much weight each listing field carries.

Measuring how the assistant describes and recommends your products is the logical next step, and it is not easy to do by hand. SourceVision measures how ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity recommend your products today: we ask the questions your shoppers ask, many times over, and report how often you appear, with the range across runs. Alexa for Shopping arrives with our Amazon integration, which is not live yet. See how it works.

SourceVision is in an invite-only beta.

Request an invite

What is Amazon Buy for Me?

Buy for Me lets a US shopper buy, inside the Amazon app, a product that Amazon does not sell, from the brand’s own website. Amazon’s agent completes the purchase with the shopper’s encrypted details. The brand handles delivery, returns and service. Amazon said at launch that brands can choose whether to take part.

Amazon announced it in April 2025, in beta for a subset of US customers on iOS and Android. It uses agentic AI to buy from other brands’ sites, securely providing the shopper’s encrypted name, address and payment details. Amazon said at launch that brands have the choice whether to participate. In March 2026, Amazon said Shop Direct, which shows products from stores across the web, was available to all US customers, with tens of millions of products that can be bought through Buy for Me. Merchants can now send product data to it through the feed providers Feedonomics, Salsify and CEDCommerce.

This is where Amazon’s assistant reaches merchants on every platform, including brands with no Amazon presence. Two points matter most to merchants:

• Where product data comes from. Publicly available information on merchant websites, or, since March 2026, a product feed sent through a participating feed provider.
• Where to find the details. Amazon keeps a Shop Direct FAQ for merchants. Read it before you decide whether to take part.

The same rule applies here as everywhere else in AI shopping: the clearer and more complete your own product pages are, the less the agent has to guess.

For the wider picture of AI agents that shop for people, including ChatGPT, Google and Perplexity, read our guide to AI shopping agents.