Stripe Sessions 2026: 288 launches, Google AI Mode, token billing

On May 4, 2026, Stripe announced 288 new products and features at its annual Sessions conference. Headline launches included a Google partnership for selling inside AI Mode and the Gemini app, token billing for AI agent transactions, and continued co-development of an open agentic commerce protocol with OpenAI. It is the largest single-day product release in Stripe history.

When a shopper using Google AI Mode or the Gemini app expresses purchase intent, the agent surfaces merchant offers and routes checkout through Stripe rails. The merchant keeps the customer relationship and payment data; Google handles discovery and conversational context. For brands already running Shopify or BigCommerce on Stripe, this is largely a configuration change rather than a new platform integration.

Token billing is a metered pricing model where AI agent actions, queries or completed transactions can be billed per unit instead of per subscription. For sellers, the practical impact is the ability to differentiate pricing or terms for agent-driven purchases versus human checkouts - useful when an agent buys at high volume and predictable cadence rather than impulse.

Amazon brands typically run a Shopify or DTC storefront alongside their marketplace presence. Stripe Sessions 2026 makes that off-Amazon surface materially more agent-ready, which means margin reporting can no longer treat Amazon, Shopify and an agent-driven channel as one number. Brands need a SKU-level P&L that reconciles Amazon fees, off-Amazon Stripe fees and agent-referral attribution in one place.

Audit which of your storefronts run on Stripe today, tag agent-referral traffic as a distinct channel in your analytics, set per-SKU margin floors that hold across human and agent checkouts, and consolidate your reporting so Amazon and off-Amazon sales sit in the same view. Nova Profit & Loss reconciles 40+ Amazon fee types at the SKU level and Data API exports let you blend Stripe and marketplace data without a custom warehouse build.