AI has left the chat window: in 2026 it will be booking, shopping and making decisions for us

“The next big digital revolution is not about chatbots, but about autonomous AI agents that search, choose, book, buy and make business decisions on their own. All this means that in the coming years, our target audience will no longer be just people, but autonomous software that makes decisions independently. This means radically new rules of the game for all digital players” 

– says Tamás Geiger, Chief Operating Officer of JabJab Online Marketing.

JabJab AI Traffic measures stable and growing organic traffic Index

Three years after the explosion of LLM tools (AI assistants that you can talk to), it is clear that artificial intelligence is fundamentally reshaping user decision-making. Meanwhile, the previously expected drastic decline in organic traffic has still not materialized. According to the latest analysis by digital marketing agency JabJab, traffic not only remained stable, but also grew spectacularly in several areas in the fourth quarter of 2025.

The AI ​​Traffic Index study – which the agency prepares quarterly – processes data from 12 segments, from news portals to marketplaces and electronics online stores to drugstores and accommodation aggregators. The sample, which was expanded from 6 to 12, reflects the previous research result: the role of artificial intelligence tools is increasingly decisive, but they do not take away traffic from websites, but rather open a new type of channel.

AI has also entered Christmas shopping

After the traffic peaks in February and May at the beginning of the year, a new, prominent wave arrived in September 2025. This shows that users are no longer using AI not only to solve immediate problems, but also to prepare for more complex life situations – such as annual planning or Christmas shopping. Based on year-end data, electronics online stores were one of the big winners of the last quarter of 2025. AI tools here not only provided inspiration, but also drove real traffic, especially for product comparisons. For drugstores, the “last minute” gift-giving season brought a surge. On recipe sites, the October search wave shows the seasonal role of artificial intelligence inspiration. On accommodation aggregators, the use of artificial intelligence related to winter and summer travel planning has drawn clear peaks – according to the analysis of the JabJab AI Traffic Index. 

AI no longer just responds – it also acts

While generative AI (e.g. early ChatGPT versions) primarily produced texts and provided static information, agentic AI now independently understands the goal, plans the necessary steps, communicates with external systems, retrieves data and, if authorized, even performs operations, whether booking, purchasing or updating data. A simple command, for example, “Book a 3-day business trip to Berlin for under 500 euros!” triggers dozens of background processes: price comparison, inventory check, offer optimization, and even a transaction. And this operation is nothing less than a complete redefinition of digital assistants. Companies now need to make their data understandable not only to users, but also to the AI ​​agents making the decisions.

Where decisions are made, there is risk – new governance is needed

The emergence of autonomous AI agents is not only a technological challenge, but also a strategic and ethical one. According to JabJab experts, the biggest risks could be AI decisions based on faulty data sets, blurred lines of responsibility, improper handling of sensitive data, accidental data leaks to external APIs, and reasoning errors. “Companies must now decide to what extent they will transfer authority to agents and where they will retain human control. The ‘human-in-the-loop’ solution will be one of the most important points of defense” – emphasizes Tamás Geiger.