Is Agents Catalog API the source of truth for partner agentic channel (OpenAI)?

[guy]

Hi folks - we’re trying to understand the Shopify → OpenAI data path for the commerce integration and what fields are actually synced.

We can map basics from Catalog responses (title/description/variantUrl/images/price..), but we’re trying to understand what Shopify considers authoritative for “agentic channels” and how to get best field coverage.

We’re looking at:

• Agents Catalog API / Catalog MCP docs: https://shopify.dev/docs/agents/catalog

• Catalog API reference: https://shopify.dev/docs/agents/catalog/catalog-api

• OpenAI Product Feed spec (for comparison): https://developers.openai.com/commerce/specs/feed

Questions

1. For OpenAI, is the Agents Catalog API intended to be the canonical “store representation” / source-of-truth used to render products, price, availability, variants, URLs, etc.?

   Or is OpenAI powered by a separate “synced feed” generated by Shopify, and Catalog is primarily a discovery layer for other agentic channels?

2. If Catalog is the source-of-truth:

• where do missing feed-style fields come from (e.g., GTIN/MPN/sale windows, return window) Where are these expected to originate from?

  If there is a Shopify→OpenAI synced feed:

• Is there an authoritative field list / mapping contract we can reference?

Thanks!

[Paige-Shopify]

Hi @guy,

1. OpenAI’s data comes from a combination of the Catalog API and their own scraped/crawled data.

2. Yes. The Catalog API is the source of truth for product data.

You can rely on Catalog API, Catalog Feed, or both to create an agentic experience. The Catalog is the source of truth and the Catalog feed is another consumption format (updated daily) that you can access through Dev Dashboard:

Let me know if you have any other questions