Pinterest launches Ask Pinterest, an AI-driven shopping platform

Pinterest has introduced a new experimental platform, Ask Pinterest, which harnesses conversational AI to enhance shopping and discovery experiences. The launch signals the company’s growing focus on AI-driven tools and comes ahead of the Cannes Lions 2026 festival, where AI innovations for marketers and advertisers are expected to dominate discussions.

Ask Pinterest is a standalone, web-based application available on both desktop and mobile devices with limited access. Unlike the core Pinterest app, this experimental platform aims to offer a more conversational, visual-first, and agentic shopping experience. It is powered by Pinterest’s proprietary Taste Graph, a system that maps users’ interests, preferences, and aesthetics to deliver personalized recommendations.

The platform leverages natural-language interactions to assist users with complex and multi-step decisions that go beyond traditional search queries. Examples of such use cases include planning a budget-friendly dinner party, selecting gifts, or furnishing a room over time.

One of the noteworthy features of Ask Pinterest is its ability to retain context across sessions, enabling users to continue long-term shopping and discovery journeys seamlessly. Lee Brown, Chief Business Officer at Pinterest, stated in a blog post that the company is building AI experiences and infrastructure to utilize user signals in more meaningful and relevant ways. Insights gained from this experiment are expected to inform future developments across Pinterest’s ecosystem.

The launch comes amidst heightened competition in the AI landscape, with companies like Google, Meta, and OpenAI expanding their own AI-powered shopping and discovery tools. Pinterest is also rolling out additional AI initiatives targeting advertisers and marketers, including a beta AI assistant within Ads Manager, a Performance + Creative model for optimizing ad creatives, and the Pinterest Model Context Protocol (MCP), an infrastructure layer for campaign management via third-party tools.

This strategic move underscores Pinterest’s commitment to leveraging AI to redefine user experiences and support advertisers in navigating the evolving digital landscape.