OpenAI’s New AI Agent Can Order Groceries for You. Analysts Say That’s Bad News For Google.

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI’s new Operator AI agent could have huge implications for Google Search, gig economy companies like Uber (UBER), and digital advertisers, according to analysts.

Operator, released Thursday to users of OpenAI’s $200 monthly Pro plan, can order groceries and book travel through a user’s web browser, according to OpenAI. The company said it expects to eventually roll Operator out to users of its $20 monthly Plus tier, and ultimately integrate it with ChatGPT. 

Instacart (CART), DoorDash (DASH), Uber, and other gig-economy companies could be among the biggest beneficiaries if Operator can streamline the ordering process, analysts at Bank of America told clients in a note Friday. OpenAI is collaborating with those companies, along with Booking Holdings’ (BKNG) OpenTable and Priceline, among others. 

BofA projects aggregate gig economy bookings in the U.S. could reach $240 billion in 2025, and said AI agents like Operator may boost growth. If Operator proves successful, that might lead to higher conversion rates for those companies, the bank said.

However, JPMorgan analysts warned it could also lead users to spend less time on retail websites, which may negatively impact opportunities for new product discovery and cross-selling. For instance, if a user asks Operator to find a recipe and order the ingredients from Instacart, that could eliminate the search traffic that might have otherwise gone to Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Google and stop users from seeing digital ads along the way, JPMorgan said. Notably, the analysts speculated Operator is blocked by Alphabet’s YouTube and Reddit (RDDT), the latter of which gets up to half its traffic from Google. 

Operator also presents competition for Google’s own AI agent ambitions, which include an agent called Project Mariner announced in December. It will also compete with Meta (META), which JPMorgan expects to ramp up its Llama 4 generative AI platform this year with some services similar to Operator.