For decades, luxury shopping began with a beautifully designed boutique, a glossy magazine spread or a carefully curated campaign. Today, it increasingly starts with a prompt.
According to the fifth edition of Bain & Company’s Luxury and Technology report, produced in partnership with the Comité Colbert, artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming how consumers discover, compare and ultimately purchase luxury brands. While luxury houses have traditionally relied on heritage, exclusivity and human connection to shape the customer journey, AI is emerging as an entirely new point of entry, one that many brands are only beginning to understand.
Luxury Consumers Are Already Shopping With AI
The report reveals that luxury consumers are embracing AI faster than the industry itself. Across global markets, shoppers are increasingly turning to AI tools before making a purchase, with adoption particularly high in China (64%) and the US (54%). Among top-tier luxury consumers, the numbers are even more striking: 82% used AI during their most recent luxury purchase, compared to just 28% of lower-spending customers.
The technology isn’t replacing traditional shopping experiences, but enhancing them. Nearly half of customers who ultimately purchased in-store used AI before stepping into a boutique, relying on it to compare products, research brands and make more informed decisions.
Perhaps most tellingly, 97% of respondents said they intend to use AI again for their next luxury purchase, highlighting just how quickly these tools are becoming part of the modern shopping journey.
Brands Are Racing to Catch Up
Luxury houses are beginning to respond. The report found that 22% of luxury groups now rank AI among their top three corporate priorities for the next three years, up significantly from just 5% in 2024. Meanwhile, 61% now place AI within their top ten strategic priorities.
Yet despite this growing focus, implementation remains uneven. Large, multi-brand luxury groups have generally developed clearer AI roadmaps than independent maisons, while smaller houses continue to experiment without fully integrating the technology into their businesses.
For now, AI deployment remains concentrated behind the scenes, particularly across operational and support functions. Customer-facing applications, however, have been slower to evolve, suggesting the industry’s biggest opportunity still lies ahead.
Is Exclusivity Compatible With AI?
Luxury has always thrived on scarcity. Discovery was meant to feel personal, a recommendation from a stylist, a chance encounter inside a flagship boutique or a beautifully photographed editorial that sparked desire. AI democratises that discovery.
That’s both exciting and slightly uncomfortable for an industry that has long relied on carefully managing access. When anyone can ask an AI assistant to compare luxury handbags, recommend emerging designers or explain the difference between maisons in seconds, the traditional gatekeepers begin to lose some of their influence.
The challenge isn’t whether luxury should embrace AI, it already has to. The real question is whether brands can preserve the emotion, craftsmanship and mystique that define luxury while adapting to technology designed for speed and convenience.
