California-based grocery technology company Instacart is using ChatGPT to help shoppers with their questions.

Ask Instacart is an AI-powered search tool designed to assist with customers’ grocery shopping questions, saving them time and helping them make food-related decisions by offering personalised recommendations while they are shopping.

By leveraging the language understanding capabilities of OpenAI’s ChatGPT API and Instacart’s own AI models and catalogue data that span more than a billion shoppable items across more than 80,000 retail partner locations, Ask Instacart invites customers to ask questions about what to eat and how to make it, helping tackle the age-old daily question: What’s for dinner?

Starting to roll out to Instacart customers now and scaling to all US customers over the coming weeks, Ask Instacart is a reimagined yet familiar search experience directly embedded in the search bar in the Instacart app, providing product recommendations that are intuitively organised, as well as additional useful information about food preparation, product attributes, dietary considerations and more.

The enhanced search experience also incorporates personalised question prompts into the search bar that anticipate customer preferences, remind them of their needs based on their shopping history, and inspire them to discover new products.

“A simple question like ‘What’s for dinner?’ is among the most complex for families everywhere to answer,” said JJ Zhuang, chief architect at Instacart. “From decisions about budget and dietary specifications to cooking skills, personal preferences and so much more, Ask Instacart can help customers answer all of their food questions and deliver the ingredients for the perfect meal in as fast as an hour. Whether it’s ‘What’s the best fish for tacos?’ or ‘What should I make for a Memorial Day BBQ?’, by supercharging Instacart search with generative AI we can create a truly inspiring experience that unlocks even more opportunities to engage and help customers as they shop online from their favourite retailers.”

With Ask Instacart, shoppers will be able to understand what ingredients or dishes pair well with others, such as: “What kind of side dishes should I serve with lamb chops?” They can discover alternative ingredients that can be swapped for one another, such as: “What fish is similar to salmon?” They can get more information on cooking techniques, such as: “What are good sauces for grilling chicken?” Lists of ingredients can be generated if they have a meal in mind, such as: “What can I use in a stir fry?” They can learn more about item attributes so they can get personalised dietary inspiration, such as; “What are dairy-free snacks for kids?” And they can discover broader, context-specific inspiration for more open-ended queries, such as: “What are the best veggies to roast?”

Ask Instacart will also help match consumer needs – through the questions asked – with brand partners’ sponsored product campaigns, creating a more convenient way for people to discover products and access the products they already know.

The launch comes as part of a growing suite of AI-native initiatives from Instacart that will be rolled out over the next year and beyond. In March, the company debuted an Instacart plugin for ChatGPT, which lets ChatGPT users express their food needs in natural language, with Instacart’s ability to make those needs instantly shoppable with ingredients delivered to their door in as fast as an hour.

Since that launch, the Instacart plugin has been made available to all ChatGPT Plus subscribers, and Instacart has plans to launch additional plugins with Microsoft Bing and Google Bard in the coming months.

Because generative AI technology is still in its early stages, Ask Instacart is a specialised model designed to respond only to relevant food-related questions.

Instacart partners more than 1200 national, regional and local retail banners to facilitate online shopping, delivery and pickup services from more than 80,000 stores across North America on the Instacart Marketplace. It makes it possible for millions of people to get the groceries they need from preferred retailers, and for approximately 600,000 Instacart shoppers to earn by picking, packing and delivering orders on their own flexible schedule.

The platform offers retailers a suite of enterprise-grade technology products and services to power their ecommerce experiences, fulfil orders, digitise brick-and-mortar stores, provide advertising services and glean insights.

• Aldi, one of America’s fastest-growing retailers, has launched a 30-minute delivery service using Instacart’s virtual convenience store technology. Aldi Express gives customers access to nearly 2000 of its most-shopped items, delivered in as fast as 30 minutes. This convenience delivery is available to shoppers from more than 2100 Aldi locations across the USA.