Over 6 million visits reach e-commerce sites via ChatGPT and transform the shopping journey

The way Brazilian consumers discover products and make online purchases is undergoing a profound shift. A study by Cadastra in partnership with Similarweb shows that generative artificial intelligence tools, such as ChatGPT, are redesigning the path to the consumer and altering the logic of digital marketing in the country.

The research, titled “The Future of Search: how generative AI is redefining the path to the consumer,” analyzed search behavior and online traffic between January 2023 and August 2025. The survey indicates that ChatGPT holds 99% of the national generative tools market and generated over 6.1 million referral visits to the ten largest Brazilian e-commerce sites. Mercado Livre leads with 1.8 million visits, followed by OLX (914 thousand) and Amazon (840 thousand). Magalu, Shopee, and Temu complete the ranking, demonstrating that AI has already become a central channel in the product discovery journey, reducing dependence on traditional searches.

The OpenAI platform accumulates over 310 million monthly visits, a growth of 124% in 12 months. Perplexity, the second-place platform, recorded just over 2 million visits – still far from ChatGPT's reach but with a 131% increase. These numbers indicate that the Brazilian consumer is gradually migrating to AI-mediated consumption flows, with a direct impact on online visibility strategies.

This advancement marks the beginning of so-called predictive conversational search, where queries function as continuous dialogues, with more detail and context. While traditional SEO searches average four words, interactions with AI reach up to 23 words and sessions exceeding seven minutes. In this environment, keywords lose strength, and objective, structured, and contextual responses gain relevance – essential for brands to be cited as reliable sources by the models.

Brazil already holds the third position in global traffic for these platforms, behind only the United States and India. Between January and August 2025, Google recorded a 0.8% drop in national traffic, reaching 38.57 billion visits; in the same period, ChatGPT grew 71.9%, reaching 1.97 billion visits and accounting for 67% of the traffic among the country's major chatbots. Over 12 months, its audience increased by 260.7%, with an average of 252.9 million monthly visits and 24.1 million unique visitors. Similar trends appear in the USA: users who utilized ChatGPT for four months subsequently clicked 26% less on Google links.

The impact of this shift on e-commerce performance is already evident in the data. In the United States, nearly 60% of consumers use generative AI to make online purchasing decisions. In Brazil, the ten largest e-commerce sites received over 6 million visits originating from ChatGPT between 2023 and 2025. The technology shortens the journey, reduces the interval between discovery and purchase decision, and tends to accelerate this process further with the arrival of Instant Checkout, which will enable direct transactions within the platform.

The most active audience is young: users between 18 and 34 years old represent almost 60% of ChatGPT's user base. Different sectors reveal their own patterns. In the pharmaceutical retail sector, the use of AI focuses on price comparisons; in fashion, marketplaces for used products, such as Enjoei, receive a strong volume of traffic; in the travel segment, mobility apps like Uber surpass accommodation and ticket platforms, indicating a preference for immediate solutions.

For Hygor Roque, Head of Marketing daDivibank, optimizing content for generative AI requires clarity, structure, and precision. “The challenge is not just to appear, but to be recognized as a reliable reference, transforming visibility into conversion and consolidating brand presence in a rapidly changing digital landscape,” he states. If you are interested in this topic, just let me know and I will connect you with the executive.