# AI Doesn’t Just Increase Buying, It Increases Conviction: Three Findings from the Q2 2026 US Consumer Survey

### Key Takeaways

- Locus’s Q2 2026 US Consumer Survey finds AI users behave materially differently from non-AI users across brand consideration, basket size, and buying confidence — large enough to change demand, fulfillment, and brand strategy.
- AI users are 2x+ more likely to try new brands (39% vs 18%) and put more items in carts (37% vs 17%), and 3x+ more likely to feel confident buying fewer items (34% vs 11%). Three behaviors at once.
- Retailers reading AI as a single amplification trend miss the shift. Retailers reading three behaviors — wider consideration, larger baskets, deliberation — find the signal reshaping demand patterns.
- Operational implications cascade. Demand planning may underestimate volatility. Last-mile package mix shifts. Brand defensibility erodes while returns patterns evolve.
- For CSCOs, CMOs, and Heads of Ecommerce, Demand Planning, and Last-Mile, the question is whether architecture reads AI as three patterns — or one trend missing the structural shift.

AI-assisted shopping has crossed the threshold from emerging behavior into material consumer pattern. Among US consumers who already use AI tools for shopping — recommendation engines, conversational shopping assistants, AI-powered search, generative product discovery — buying behavior diverges materially from the non-AI consumer baseline. The divergence is not subtle. **Locus’s Q2 2026 US Consumer Survey** finds AI users are more than twice as likely than non-AI users across multiple buying behaviors simultaneously — and the behaviors don’t all point in the same direction.

### Finding 1: AI Users Are More Than Twice as Likely to Try New Brands

**The data.** 18% of all US consumers say they’re likely to try new brands or products in their next purchase cycle. Among consumers who use AI tools for shopping, the figure rises to 39% — more than 2x the baseline rate.

**What it means.** AI-assisted discovery widens the consideration set materially. Consumers using AI tools encounter brands they wouldn’t have considered through search-and-browse discovery patterns. The expanded consideration set affects brand defensibility for incumbents and creates a discovery window for challenger brands.

**Operational implications cascade.** Demand planning models trained on incumbent loyalty assumptions may understate volume shifts as consumers test new brands at higher rates.

### Finding 2: AI Users Put More Than Twice the Items in Their Carts

**The data.** 17% of all US consumers say they buy more items per order than they did previously. Among AI users, the figure rises to 37% — also more than 2x.

**What it means.** AI assistants function as recommenders during the shopping flow, and the recommendations are landing. Consumers using AI tools add more items per order — bundled recommendations, complementary products, accessories, alternatives all surface during the AI-assisted shopping experience in ways that lift basket size.

**Operational implications cascade.** Demand planning needs basket composition awareness, not just volume forecasting. The same total order volume distributed across larger baskets produces different fulfillment economics than across more, smaller orders.

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| Also Read: [AI Shopping’s Effect on US Retail Fulfillment Operations 2026](/content/blogs/generative-ai-shopping-effect-retail-fulfillment-operations-locus-q2-2026-consumer-survey/index.html) |

### Finding 3: AI Users Are More Than Three Times More Confident Buying Fewer Items

**The data.** 11% of all US consumers say they feel confident buying fewer items than before. Among AI users, the figure rises to 34% — more than 3x.

**What it means.** AI isn’t only amplifying buying. Some consumers use AI tools to make more deliberate decisions, comparing options more rigorously, reaching higher confidence in fewer purchases.

**Operational implications cascade.** Returns patterns evolve as deliberate buying becomes more common — deliberate purchases typically return at lower rates than impulse purchases.

## Three Behaviors at Once: The Architectural Reading

The three findings appear contradictory only if AI behavior is read as a single trend. Read as three behaviors happening simultaneously, the findings form a coherent picture: AI mediates more of the shopping experience, and the mediation can produce wider consideration, larger baskets, or more deliberate purchasing depending on what the shopper is using AI for.

**Retailers reading AI behavior as a single amplification trend miss the structural shift.** Demand planning calibrated to “AI makes consumers buy more” misses the deliberation pattern. Brand strategy assuming “AI commoditizes discovery” misses the conviction-building pattern.

## FAQs

**What did Locus’s Q2 2026 US Consumer Survey find about AI shopping behavior?**

Locus’s Q2 2026 US Consumer Survey finds AI users behave materially differently from non-AI users across three connected dimensions. AI users are more than 2x more likely to try new brands (39% vs 18%), more than 2x more likely to put more items in their carts (37% vs 17%), and more than 3x more likely to feel confident buying fewer items (34% vs 11%).

**How does AI change consumer brand consideration?**

AI-assisted shopping widens the consideration set materially. Consumers using AI tools encounter brands they wouldn’t have found through traditional search-and-browse patterns. 39% of AI users say they’re likely to try new brands compared with 18% of all consumers — more than twice the baseline rate.

**Why do AI users put more items in their carts?**

AI assistants function as recommenders during shopping flows, and the recommendations are landing. Bundled recommendations, complementary products, accessories, and alternatives surface during AI-assisted shopping.

**Why are some AI users buying fewer items?**

Some consumers use AI for deliberation rather than amplification — comparing options more rigorously, reaching higher confidence in fewer purchases. 34% of AI users feel confident buying fewer items compared with 11% of all consumers.