Vodnjan, Croatia – 22 September 2026 – Global AI-first cloud communications platform Infobip predicts more than 7.3 billion customer interactions across Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2026, as AI and conversational channels transform how consumers discover products, receive offers and access support. New Infobip research also reveals that 63.2% of consumers have used an AI assistant or chatbot while shopping during the past 12 months.
Black Friday is no longer a single shopping event. Infobip’s research shows that the shopping season now begins weeks earlier and continues through the entire customer journey. Nearly six in ten respondents will have started holiday shopping by early November, while only 19% wait until Black Friday week itself. This extended shopping window is creating new pressure for retailers to engage customers earlier, with better timing, more relevant offers and frictionless support across the channels consumers already use.
AI is becoming a central part of that journey. According to the research, 63.2% of consumers have used an AI assistant or chatbot for shopping in the last 12 months, with 21.9% using one frequently. Among consumers willing to use AI for shopping, 73.4% would use it to compare products and 67.8% would use it to find deals matching their preferences. However, the data also shows clear boundaries: consumers are more willing to let AI inform decisions than make decisions or handle complaints on their behalf.
The data suggests that while email remains a dominant channel for deals and updates, conversational and mobile channels are becoming increasingly important for time-sensitive, personalized retail engagement. Consumers selected email as the preferred channel for deals and updates globally, but SMS is chosen far more often for updates than offers, showing that retailers can build trust through transactional communications before expanding into promotional engagement.
Speed is also becoming a baseline expectation. Infobip’s survey found that 85% of consumers expect an order confirmation within five minutes, while 47% expect a support answer within five minutes. For retailers, this means AI and automation are no longer only tools for efficiency; they are becoming essential to meeting customer expectations during high-volume periods.
Goran JuršićChief Growth Officer at InfobipExplore all Infobip’s predictions here: https://www.infobip.com/blog/shopping-season-survey
About Infobip
Infobip is a global cloud communications platform that enables businesses to build connected experiences across all stages of the customer journey, with AI as the driving force of innovation. Through a single, natively built platform, Infobip delivers omnichannel engagement, identity, user authentication and contact centre solutions that help businesses and partners overcome the complexity of consumer communications while driving growth and increasing customer loyalty. Infobip is focused on enabling and accelerating AI adoption as it continues its transformation into an AI-first company. Infobip’s technology has the capacity to reach over seven billion mobile devices in 6 continents connected to 10k+ connections of which 800+ are direct operator connections. The company was established in 2006 and is led by its co-founders, CEO Silvio Kutić and CTO Izabel Jelenić.
