Debenhams Group, home to PrettyLittleThing, boohoo, boohooMAN, Karen Millen and Debenhams, has partnered with PayPal on an AI-driven shopping experience, becoming the first retailer in the UK to enable customers to discover, receive personalised recommendations and check out entirely within the PayPal app.
PayPal is currently testing the AI assistant with select US customers, with a broader US and UK launch planned later this year. Through the partnership, shoppers can use an AI assistant within PayPal to ask for product suggestions, explore relevant items and browse curated selections from brands including Karen Millen, boohoo and boohooMAN. Customers can then complete their purchase directly within the chat experience, with PayPal automatically using saved account details for home delivery.
Unlike traditional search, the agentic AI assistant understands a shopper’s profile, asks follow-up questions and acts on their behalf – guiding customers to relevant product pages and tailoring recommendations to suit their taste and budget.
With 16% of Debenhams Group’s sales already processed through PayPal, which serves millions of shoppers worldwide, the partnership has the potential to expand the Group’s customer reach while delivering a faster, more seamless shopping experience across its brands.
Co-developed by PayPal and Debenhams Group, the experience is currently available to shoppers in the US, where it has also been integrated with AI tools such as Perplexity and Microsoft Copilot, and will roll out across additional Debenhams Group brands over time.
The launch forms part of Debenhams Group’s wider AI strategy, which includes a recent partnership with Peak AI to improve forecasting across sales, stock and pricing, as well as the creation of the Debenhams Group AI Skills Academy to equip employees with practical, applied AI capabilities.
Dan Finley, CEO of Debenhams Group, said:
“At Debenhams Group, our goal is to help customers discover and be inspired by new products and brands, while making shopping as easy and enjoyable as possible. This kind of innovation has the potential to fundamentally transform online retail; in a way we haven’t seen since the shift to mobile shopping.
“We’re proud to be the first UK retailer to partner with PayPal on this experience, bringing a faster, more intuitive way to shop to customers across our brands.”
Mike Edmonds, VP of Agentic Commerce at PayPal said:
“With agentic commerce, shopping becomes a conversation, not a search. By embedding AI-powered discovery and checkout directly into the PayPal app, we’re helping customers move seamlessly from inspiration to purchase, while giving retailers like Debenhams Group a powerful new way to engage shoppers at scale. It’s exciting to collaborate with an established UK retail group to bring this technology to market.”
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