Agentic Commerce Glossary

Key terms and concepts in the agentic commerce ecosystem.

A2A

Agent-to-Agent protocol. A communication standard that enables AI agents to interact directly with one another, delegating subtasks across specialized agents without human intermediation.

ACP

Agent Commerce Protocol. A protocol focused on the checkout experience, covering product selection through payment completion. ACP defines how an AI agent discovers products, builds a cart, and initiates a transaction on behalf of a user.

Agent Readiness Score

A composite metric from 0 to 100 that evaluates how well a commerce endpoint handles AI agent interactions. Scores are calculated across five categories: Discovery, Cart & Checkout, Payment Handling, Fulfillment, and Error Recovery.

Agentic Commerce

The emerging paradigm in which AI agents autonomously browse, compare, and purchase products or services on behalf of human users. Agentic commerce shifts the buyer interface from visual storefronts to structured, machine-readable protocols.

AP2

Agent Payment Protocol. A specification for how AI agents securely handle payment credentials, tokenization, and transaction authorization without exposing raw financial data to intermediate systems.

Checkout Session

A time-bound, stateful object that represents an in-progress transaction between an AI agent and a commerce endpoint. Checkout sessions track cart contents, pricing, shipping options, and payment status until the transaction is completed or abandoned.

Continue URL

A callback URL provided by a commerce endpoint that allows an AI agent to hand off a partially completed transaction to a human user for final review or approval, typically used for high-value purchases or when agent authorization is insufficient.

Digital Twin

A virtual replica of a commerce storefront or API that mirrors real-world behavior in a sandboxed environment. Digital twins allow AI agents to be tested against realistic conditions without affecting live systems.

Fulfillment Option

A structured object describing how an order can be delivered to the buyer, including shipping method, estimated delivery window, cost, and carrier details. Agentic commerce protocols require fulfillment options to be machine-readable so agents can compare and select on behalf of users.

Idempotency Key

A unique, client-generated identifier attached to a request that ensures the same operation is not executed more than once, even if the request is retried. Critical in agentic commerce to prevent duplicate orders when agents retry failed checkout attempts.

MCP

Model Context Protocol. A standard for exposing tools and data sources to large language models. In the commerce context, MCP servers provide AI agents with structured access to product catalogs, inventory, and order management systems.

Payment Handler

A service or module responsible for processing payment transactions initiated by AI agents. Payment handlers manage tokenization, authorization, capture, and refund flows while enforcing security policies like fraud detection and spending limits.

Product Feed

A structured, machine-readable data source that provides AI agents with up-to-date product information including titles, descriptions, pricing, availability, and variant details. Stale or incomplete product feeds are a leading cause of agent checkout failures.

Session Escalation

The process by which an AI agent transfers an in-progress interaction to a human operator or a different system when it cannot complete a task autonomously. Graceful session escalation preserves context, cart state, and user intent across the handoff.

SharedPaymentToken

A tokenized payment credential that can be securely shared between an AI agent and a commerce endpoint without exposing the underlying card number or bank details. SharedPaymentTokens are scoped to specific merchants and transaction amounts.

Synthetic Agent

A test agent created by Prova that mimics the behavior of real AI assistants like GPT-4o, Claude, or Gemini. Synthetic agents use randomized personas and interaction patterns to stress-test commerce endpoints under realistic, non-deterministic conditions.

UCP

Unified Commerce Protocol. A comprehensive protocol covering the full commerce lifecycle—from product discovery through post-purchase flows like order tracking, returns, refunds, and subscription management. UCP extends ACP with fulfillment and customer service capabilities.

Well-Known UCP Manifest

A JSON configuration file hosted at a standardized path (typically /.well-known/ucp.json) that declares a merchant’s UCP capabilities, supported payment methods, API endpoints, and versioning information. AI agents use this manifest to discover and negotiate commerce interactions automatically.