South African retailers debut AI grocery shopping assistants

South Africa’s two largest grocery chains have rolled out new artificial‑intelligence‑powered assistants to streamline online shopping. Pick n Pay introduced “Penny”, built on Google’s Gemini models, letting customers add items by voice, text or photo and offering recipe ideas, ingredient swaps and budget tips. The service began a limited launch on 6 July and will expand to all users of the “asap!” app.

Woolworths upgraded its Olive assistant, also using Gemini Enterprise, adding personalised meal‑planning, budget‑friendly “smart swaps”, a Snap & Shop feature that converts photos of handwritten lists into baskets, and predictive “Smart Baskets”. The enhancements will be available to all Woolworths app users later this month. Both retailers aim to compete with Shoprite’s Checkers Sixty60 platform, which already offers AI‑driven replenishment tools.

The deployments reflect a broader shift in South African retail toward generative‑AI tools that move shoppers from manual search to conversational ordering, with future plans to deepen integration and possibly introduce autonomous checkout functions.