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Google Merchant Center for AI Mode and Gemini: setup by market (US, Canada, Australia, UK)

How Merchant Center feeds Google AI Mode and Gemini, where UCP checkout is open by market, the feed attributes to add and a pre-launch checklist.

By the ConversionVector teamUpdated 13 min read

Contents

Direct answer: Google AI Mode and Gemini get their product data from Google Merchant Center. Google says there are "no additional requirements" to appear in AI Mode and lists "Checking that your Merchant Center ... information is up-to-date" among its best practices, so discovery depends on an approved Merchant Center feed, and AI Mode is available in the UK and most of the EU as well as North America and Australia. Checkout on Google is separate. As of 2 November 2026, Google's UCP-powered checkout covers products eligible in the US, Canada and Australia, for select merchants only; Google's onboarding hub is rolling out in the US first, with Australia and Canada "next year", and the UK was promised "later" with no date. To prepare in any market: clean product data, conversational attributes, return policy and customer support details in Merchant Center, and the checkout attributes in a supplemental data source.

This guide is for ecommerce managers, PPC and feed leads at retailers selling in the US, Canada, Australia, the UK and the EU. It covers the difference between discovery and checkout, the status in each market, the Merchant Center settings and feed attributes Google asks for, what to exclude, and a checklist by market.

Last verified: 2 November 2026 against Google Merchant Center Help (UCP checkout, UCP integration hub onboarding, free listings, product data specification, conversational attributes, return policies and AI performance insights), Google's UCP Merchant Center guide for developers (last updated 29 October 2026), Google Search Central, Google Search Help, Google's May and October 2026 shopping announcements, ucp.dev and Shopify's Help Center. Google changes these pages often, so check the linked versions before you plan around them.

Discovery and checkout are two different things

Discovery in AI Mode and GeminiUCP-powered checkout on Google
What it doesYour products appear in shopping answers and link to your siteShoppers press Buy and pay on Google with Google Pay. You remain the merchant of record
What it needsMerchant Center account, products approved for free listings, accurate dataEverything for discovery, plus return policy and customer support details in Merchant Center, the native_commerce attributes, a Google Pay & Wallet Console account and a UCP integration
Who can use itAny merchant meeting Merchant Center policies, where free listings and AI Mode are available"Select merchants at this time", via an interest form
Primary sourceAI features and your website, Free listingsMerchant Center Help, UCP Merchant Center guide

Google's guidance on AI features in Search is short: "There are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary." Its best practices include "Making sure your structured data matches the visible text on the page" and "Checking that your Merchant Center and Business Profile information is up-to-date", and it adds: "You don't need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, or markup to appear in these features" (Google Search Central). Google's free listings page names Gemini among the places free listings can appear, and Shopify's help for the channel says "Product discovery for Google AI Mode and Gemini is powered by Google Merchant Center."

So the discovery work is the feed and page hygiene that already powers Shopping, done thoroughly. For how Merchant Center compares with the ChatGPT, Copilot and Perplexity routes, see Product feeds for AI shopping.

Status by market (last verified 2 November 2026)

MarketDiscovery via Merchant CenterUCP checkout on GoogleWhat Google and Shopify say
United StatesYesSelect merchants, via interest form. Universal Cart launched 15 October 2026Merchant Center integration hub "gradually rolling out in the U.S." (Google)
CanadaYesHelp page covers eligible products; select merchantsIntegration hub: "Australia and Canada to follow next year". Shopify's direct checkout on Google is "rolling out gradually" to customers in the US, Canada and Australia
AustraliaYesAs CanadaAs Canada
United KingdomYesNot yet"and later to the U.K." (20 May 2026, Google); no date since
EU and rest of worldYes, where AI Mode and free listings are availableNot announcedWe found no date

Some dates to keep straight. In May 2026 Google said UCP-powered checkout "will roll out across Canada and Australia in the coming months, and later to the U.K." Its onboarding page now says the Merchant Center integration hub, where selected merchants set up cart transfer, native checkout and identity linking and test in a sandbox, is rolling out in the US "with Australia and Canada to follow next year". That page is about merchant onboarding; it does not say whether shoppers in Canada and Australia will see checkout sooner. On 15 October 2026 Google launched Universal Cart in the US across Search and the Gemini app. Our guide to Google Universal Cart covers cart transfer in detail.

AI Mode itself is far wider than checkout. Google's Search Help lists the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and most European countries among the places it is available. Google's AI performance insights report in Merchant Center, which shows your share of voice on AI surfaces, is narrower: English-language queries for Merchant Center accounts in Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand and the US.

Where your shoppers are matters, not where you are based. Shopify's help says a store selling into Google's checkout "can be based in any country" if it sells to customers in the US, Canada or Australia. A UK or EU retailer already shipping to those markets can prepare for checkout there now.

Step 1: get the Merchant Center basics right (every market)

Google's UCP guide starts here: "You must have a Merchant Center account in good standing and approved products for free listings in your account" (Google). For discovery the same foundation applies:

  • Required attributes on every product. id, title, description, link, image_link, availability and price; brand for all new products except movies, books and music; gtin strongly recommended where one exists, and mpn required when the product has no manufacturer-assigned GTIN (product data specification). In our Agent Commerce Index Q4 2026, 105 of 225 scored retailers (47%) had no gtin, mpn or sku in their product markup (LEG-05), so check that the identifiers in your feed also appear on the page.
  • Prices that match the page, with the right tax treatment. Google's spec says to match "the price from your landing page, structured data, and at checkout". For the US and Canada, leave all taxes out of price; for all other countries, include VAT or GST.
  • Shipping costs. Google requires shipping settings or the shipping attribute for free listings in many countries, including the US, Canada, Australia, the UK, Ireland, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands (free listings).
  • Landing pages that return 200 to Google's crawlers and to agents, with no interstitials. See Are you blocking AI shopping agents?
  • Structured data that matches the page. See Product structured data for AI agents.
  • Diagnostics clear. Fix disapprovals and warnings before adding anything new.

Step 2: add conversational attributes (every market)

Google added six optional "conversational attributes" to the product data specification: question_and_answer, document_link, related_product, item_group_title, variant_option and popularity_rank. Google says they "help AI systems and conversational agents better understand your products' specific nuances" across "AI Mode in Search and more", and that "Including them won't impact the approval status of your existing products" (Merchant Center Help). In May 2026 Google said "retailers globally can use conversational attributes", and the attribute pages say they "can be used in all countries".

AttributeWhat to put in itGoogle's limits
question_and_answerReal product questions: compatibility, sizing, materials, what is in the boxUp to 30 pairs, each question and answer up to 1,000 characters, 10,000 in total. No price, shipping, dates or company name
document_linkManuals, assembly instructions, care guides as PDFsUp to 5 public, crawlable PDF URLs, 50 MB each
related_productAccessories, required parts, substitutesRelationship type, identifier type (GTIN or ID) and identifier
item_group_title + variant_optionThe family name and what distinguishes each variant (size, colour, width)Used with item_group_id; variant_option up to 30 times per item
popularity_rankYour own ranking of how well each item sells0 to 100, one decimal place, based on recent sales

Don't repeat what is already in description, product_highlight or product_detail. Google recommends a supplemental data source for these, the same as for the checkout attributes below. variant_option also matters for checkout: Google's UCP guide says complete variant data "prevents automated transactability discrepancies that can suppress the checkout button".

Step 3: return policy and customer support (required for checkout)

For UCP checkout Google says "You must define your return policies in Merchant Center, as it is a Merchant of Record requirement and will be referenced on the checkout screen" (Google):

  • Include return cost, return window and a link to the full policy.
  • Policies apply across the account. Use return_policy_label to restrict a policy to a subset of products, or the returns attribute to define one entirely in the feed.
  • With an advanced account, configure return policies in each sub-account.
  • Add customer support information: at least one of a support URL, email address or phone number. Google uses it for the "Contact Merchant" link on the order confirmation.

Do this even where checkout is not open. Google's return policies help says policies you upload and verify "take precedence over what we've collected from your website", and Search Central ranks Merchant Center settings above on-page markup (return policy markup). For the matching markup, see Shipping and returns in structured data. In the Index, 189 of 225 retailers (84%) had no returns terms in structured data (OFF-06) and 206 (92%) no shipping cost (OFF-04), so for most stores Merchant Center is currently the only machine-readable copy of their policy.

In the UK and EU, the policy must not offer less than the statutory cancellation right for most distance sales: 14 days from delivery under the UK's Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013 and Article 9 of the EU Consumer Rights Directive. This is not legal advice.

Step 4: the checkout and cart attributes, in a supplemental feed

Google's UCP guide lists these product-level attributes (Google):

AttributeWhat it doesRule
native_commerce(checkout_eligibility)Opts a product into checkout on Google"If set to FALSE or missing, the product won't be eligible for checkout (defaults to FALSE)"
native_commerce(cart_eligibility)Opts a product out of cart transferProducts approved for free listings are included once your UCP profile declares cart support; set FALSE to exclude
consumer_notice (notice_type, notice_message)Shows legally required warnings on the checkout screenMandatory where regulation requires it, for example California Proposition 65. Types: legal_disclaimer, safety_warning, prop_65. Message up to 1,000 characters
merchant_item_idMaps the feed id to the product ID your checkout API expectsOnly needed if they differ. It "will take precedence over id in Agentic requests"
variant_optionBuilds the variant selector on Google's checkout"Strongly recommended" for products with variants, alongside item_group_id and item_group_title

If you use both checkout and cart transfer, Google says you "must use the composite format" native_commerce(checkout_eligibility:cart_eligibility), with values such as TRUE:FALSE. One warning from the same guide: the native_commerce group "is fully overwritten with each upload and does not support incremental updates", so every upload must carry every flag or the missing ones are erased.

Google calls a supplemental data source "best practice" for these attributes, because in the primary feed "incorrect formatting may impact regular product ingestion". A minimal tab-separated supplemental file, following Google's example:

id	item_group_id	native_commerce(checkout_eligibility:cart_eligibility)	variant_option
SKU-1001	TEE-01	TRUE:TRUE	size:small,color:red
SKU-1002	TEE-01	TRUE:TRUE	size:medium,color:red
SKU-2001		FALSE:TRUE

In XML, checkout_eligibility and cart_eligibility sit inside a g:native_commerce group. With the Merchant API, send them as custom attributes on accounts.productInputs.insert. Google marks the Content API as deprecated and recommends the Merchant API, or supplemental price and inventory updates if you use scheduled feeds, to avoid checkout price mismatches.

Step 5: exclude what cannot be sold through Google's checkout

Set checkout_eligibility to FALSE, or leave it empty, for every product in Google's ineligible list:

  • Recurring or financed: subscriptions, instalment plans.
  • Customised or special fulfilment: personalised goods; used, refurbished and final-sale items; pre-orders; bundled services such as warranties, installation or setup; special shipping such as freight or premium delivery; gifting; in-store activation.
  • Policy and safety: age-restricted items such as alcohol and tobacco, and anything blocked by standard Google Shopping policy.
  • Digital and services: services, rentals, virtual items, goods that need software installed first.

If you sell through Shopify's agentic storefronts, Shopify adds its own limits for this channel: subscription-only products, product bundles, customisable products and B2B-only products are not supported, and local delivery, pickup in store and pickup points are not offered in the direct checkout (Shopify). Our guide to Shopify's Agentic plan covers the route for stores not on Shopify.

Step 6: payments, integration and applying

  • Google Pay & Wallet Console. Google says you do not need a Google Pay button on your own checkout, but you "do need to create a Google Pay & Wallet Console account". If your payment provider is not integrated with the Google Pay API, it can onboard; a direct integration without a provider also needs encryption setup and PCI compliance documentation (Merchant Center Help).
  • Payment credentials. Google says the feature currently uses standard card numbers that shoppers have stored in Google Wallet, and "More forms of payments may become available in the future."
  • The UCP integration. Either your platform provides it (Shopify's agentic storefronts do, for example) or you build to the UCP specification. UCP is versioned by date: 2026-01-11, 2026-01-23, 2026-04-08 and 2026-08-25, the current "latest", so plan for upgrades. See ACP vs UCP vs AP2 vs MCP.
  • Build first, then apply. Google's onboarding page says to complete the technical implementation, then fill in the interest form. Selected merchants are notified and get the integration hub and its sandbox; Merchant Center then flags feed, returns or account changes needed.

Pre-launch checklist by market

Every market (discovery)

  • Merchant Center account in good standing; products approved for free listings
  • Required attributes complete; real GTINs, or brand plus MPN
  • Feed price and stock match the landing page and its JSON-LD, with tax treatment right for the country
  • Shipping settings in Merchant Center match the delivery page
  • Landing pages return 200 to crawlers and agents, with no interstitials
  • Conversational attributes for top sellers, in a supplemental data source
  • Return policy (cost, window, link) and customer support details set in Merchant Center

Selling to US shoppers now, and to Canada and Australia as Google opens them (checkout)

  • UCP integration through your platform, or a direct build tested against the current UCP version
  • Supplemental data source with native_commerce flags on every upload, variant_option for variant products
  • Ineligible categories set to FALSE for checkout; cart transfer exclusions set to FALSE
  • consumer_notice on products that legally need a warning
  • merchant_item_id mapped if your checkout uses different IDs
  • Google Pay & Wallet Console account; payment provider confirmed as Google Pay-capable
  • Interest form submitted once the integration works

UK and EU shoppers (checkout not yet announced)

  • Everything in the discovery list, done well
  • Return policy at least meets the 14-day statutory cancellation right
  • Product data ready to flag eligibility on the day Google opens your market

Common mistakes

  • Putting checkout attributes in the primary feed. Google recommends a supplemental source because a formatting error there can disrupt normal product ingestion.
  • Sending only one native_commerce flag. The group is overwritten on each upload, so a file with only checkout_eligibility erases your cart_eligibility values.
  • Flagging every product TRUE. Ineligible categories should be FALSE or empty.
  • Leaving return policy only on the website. Checkout needs it in Merchant Center, and Merchant Center settings outrank on-page markup.
  • Different IDs in feed and checkout with no mapping. Use merchant_item_id.
  • Planning revenue on a UK or EU launch. Google has said "later" for the UK and nothing for the EU. Prepare, but don't forecast on it.
  • Ignoring discovery because checkout is not live. AI Mode is already available in the UK and most of the EU, free listings can appear in Gemini, and Merchant Center is where Google reads your products.

Sources

Questions

How do I get my products into Google AI Mode and Gemini?
Through Google Merchant Center. Google says there are no additional requirements to appear in AI Mode beyond normal Search best practice, and lists keeping Merchant Center information up to date among them. Merchant Center free listings can appear on Search and in Gemini, and Shopify's help for the channel says product discovery in AI Mode and Gemini is powered by Merchant Center.
Where is Google's UCP checkout available?
As of 2 November 2026, Google's Merchant Center Help says UCP-powered checkout applies to products with eligibility in the United States, Canada and Australia and is available for select merchants. Google's onboarding page says the Merchant Center integration hub is rolling out gradually in the US, with Australia and Canada to follow next year. In May 2026 Google said checkout would come later to the UK, with no date. We found no announcement for the EU.
What is native_commerce(checkout_eligibility)?
A Merchant Center product attribute that opts a product into Google's UCP-powered checkout. If it is FALSE or missing, the product is not eligible. Cart transfer works the other way round: products approved for free listings are included once your UCP profile declares cart support, unless you set native_commerce(cart_eligibility) to FALSE. Google recommends sending these through a supplemental data source.
Can a UK or EU retailer use AI Mode today?
For discovery, yes. AI Mode is available in the UK and most of Europe, and approved Merchant Center products can appear through free listings. Google's checkout on its own surfaces is not open for UK or EU shoppers yet. Use the time to get product data, conversational attributes, return policy and customer support details right, because they matter for discovery now and are required for checkout later.
Which products cannot use Google's agentic checkout?
Google's developer guide lists subscriptions, instalment plans, personalised goods, used, refurbished and final-sale items, pre-orders, bundled services such as installation or warranties, items needing special shipping such as freight, gifting, in-store activation, age-restricted items, anything blocked by Google Shopping policy, services, rentals, virtual items and goods that need software installed first.

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