Perplexity rolled out its Shopping experience to Canadian users on April 18, 2026. Product cards now appear inline in shopping-intent answers, sourced from a combination of Merchant Center feeds, public product pages with Product schema, and partner data from Shopify. For Canadian e-commerce operators, this is the first major net-new AI engine surface in 18 months.
Three primary sources: (1) Google Merchant Center product feeds (now used by Perplexity via partnership), (2) public product pages with valid Product + Offer schema, (3) Shopify storefronts with public product visibility. Pages without Product schema are functionally invisible.
(1) Validate Product + Offer schema on every PDP using the Schema Markup Validator. (2) Submit your Merchant Center feed if you haven't already. (3) Add high-quality original product imagery (Perplexity heavily prefers original to manufacturer stock). (4) Ensure your CA pricing is on the Canadian product URL — Perplexity is geo-aware.
Across 6 Canadian Shopify stores we monitor, we're seeing a small but consistent net-new traffic source labeled 'perplexity.ai' starting April 19 — averaging 0.4-1.2% of total sessions in the first week. Conversion rate is meaningfully higher than Google organic (we're seeing 4-6% vs 2-3% blended).
Perplexity Shopping launched in Canada on April 18, 2026.
Product + Offer schema is the primary discoverability requirement.
Original product imagery beats manufacturer stock.
Early conversion rate from Perplexity traffic is 2-3× Google organic.