PAYMENTS
2030: THE GENERATIONAL INFLECTION POINT
Underpinning the 2030 forecasts is evidence that younger consumers are already normalising AI‐assisted shopping. A Mastercard survey of 26,000 parents and teenagers aged between 13 and 18 across 13 countries found teens using AI to support shopping decisions at around twice the rate of their parents.
• Teens are twice as likely as their parents to be using AI weekly to find the best price or discount at 18 % versus 10 %.
• A third of teens say they’ d trust an AI’ s product recommendation over a friend’ s, while 27 % would now trust AI over their own parents’ advice.
Key findings include:
• 36 % of teens say they’ d happily hand over to a fully AI‐run shopping assistant that chooses and pays for products, compared with 24 % of parents.
• 63 % of parents expect AI shopping to define their child’ s generation, while only 6 % think it will define their own.
• More than six in 10 young people in the UK believe AI will significantly change the way their generation shops in the future.
82 October 2026