Amazon Introduces Lens Live: A Real-World AI Shopping Assistant

Amazon is making a notable advancement in AI-enhanced shopping with the launch of Lens Live on Tuesday. This innovative, AI-integrated version of the Amazon Lens shopping feature allows consumers to discover products through visual searches, similar to offerings from rivals like Google Lens and Pinterest Lens. The retailer emphasizes that this tool will collaborate with Amazon’s AI shopping assistant, Rufus, to deliver product insights.

Lens Live will enhance Amazon’s current visual search tool, Amazon Lens, which enables users to capture images, upload photos, or scan barcodes to locate products. Instead of replacing it, the new feature introduces a real-time component, allowing users to direct their phones at physical objects and view corresponding products in a swipeable carousel at the bottom of the screen.

This enhancement is part of Amazon’s overarching strategy to leverage AI for improving online shopping experiences. Over the past year, the company has rolled out various features, including its AI assistant Rufus, AI-driven shopping guides, AI-optimized product reviews, tools to help find fitting clothing, AI-generated audio product summaries, personalized shopping suggestions, and resources for sellers.

Lens Live also aligns with common customer behaviors, such as comparing prices in retail stores to determine if Amazon provides better deals on similar products.

With the Lens Live feature, customers can select any item within their camera view to activate the function and focus on that product. If they identify a suitable match, they can easily add it to their shopping cart by tapping the (+) plus icon or save it to their wish list by clicking the heart icon.

The feature utilizes Amazon SageMaker services, which facilitate the large-scale deployment of machine learning models, and operates on AWS-managed Amazon OpenSearch.

Moreover, Amazon’s AI-powered shopping assistant Rufus is integrated into the new feature, offering customers AI-generated product summaries and suggested conversational prompts for learning more about items. According to Amazon, this functionality enables shoppers to conduct quick product research and gain insights before making purchases.

Initially, the Lens Live feature will be accessible on the Amazon Shopping app for iOS, aiming at “tens of millions” of U.S. shoppers before possibly expanding to other demographics within the U.S. The company has not disclosed plans for expansion into additional global markets.