UCP - How to Actually Make Money With It

See the flow

{
  "line_items": [{
    "title": "Classic Hoodie",
    "price": 68
  }]
}

{ "payment": { "handler": "gpay", "token": "..." } }

You're a developer. How do you make money?

In UCP terms, you're a Platform - the app that sits between users and stores. Here's where the money is:

1. High-conversion affiliate

Traditional affiliate: you send a click, pray they convert, get maybe 5% commission on whatever survives the redirect.

UCP affiliate: you render checkout inside your app. User's shipping and payment are already saved. One tap. Done.

Traditional:  Click → Redirect → Login → Enter address → Enter card → Buy
              (50%+ drop-off at each step)

UCP:          Click → Confirm → Done
              (You control the whole funnel)

Higher conversion = you can negotiate better rates. You're delivering completed orders, not clicks.

2. Become the wallet

UCP has Identity Linking - OAuth that connects user accounts across merchants.

If you store the user's shipping address and payment methods, you become their "one-click checkout" everywhere. Every merchant they buy from through your app = stickier users.

This is the super-app play. WeChat did it in China. UCP makes it possible in the US without building payment rails from scratch.

3. Sell the automation

Building an AI agent? UCP has AP2 Mandates - cryptographic proof that the user actually authorized a purchase.

Your agent can autonomously:

• Reorder groceries when they run low
• Book the same hotel the user always gets
• Buy concert tickets the moment they drop

Charge a subscription for the convenience. $10/month for "my AI handles routine purchases" is reasonable if it saves people time.

4. The discount oracle

If you have coupon/deal data, you can become the service that AI agents query before checkout.

User → AI Agent → Your discount API → "Here are 3 valid codes for Nike"
                       ↓
              UCP Checkout with code applied

Every AI platform needs this. Charge per query, per successful discount, or monthly API access.

You're a Shopify store owner. What changes?

Shopify co-founded UCP. It's likely already available or coming to your store. Here's what that means:

The good

The bad

The discount extension

UCP has a specific Discount Extension for programmatic coupon codes. As a store owner:

• You see which platform submitted which code
• You can reject invalid codes with specific error messages
• You can surface your own "automatic discounts" without coupon sites
• You get analytics on discount-sensitive traffic

This is actually more control than you have today with browser extensions guessing codes.

Technical cheat sheet

If you're actually building on this, here's what matters:

Discovery

Everything starts at /.well-known/ucp. Hit that endpoint, get back what the store supports.

curl https://nike.com/.well-known/ucp

Returns capabilities, payment handlers, API endpoints.

Capabilities are modular

UCP isn't one giant API. It's modules:

• checkout - the basics (line items, totals, complete purchase)
• fulfillment - shipping options
• discounts - promo codes
• identity_linking - OAuth for loyalty accounts
• ap2_mandates - cryptographic authorization for autonomous agents

You advertise what you support. Store returns the intersection. You only use what both sides understand.

Three ways to talk

POST /api/ucp/checkout-sessions
{ "line_items": [...] }

You never touch card numbers

UCP uses Payment Handlers. You get an opaque token from Google Pay or a tokenizer, pass it to the merchant. They pass it to their PSP. Only the PSP sees real card data.

User approves in Google Pay
    ↓
You get: gpay_token_abc123
    ↓
You send to merchant: { payment: { handler: "gpay", token: "abc123" } }
    ↓
Merchant sends to Stripe
    ↓
Card charged

You're never in PCI scope.

Who's positioned to win

Bottom line

UCP is infrastructure for AI commerce. The bet:

1. AI agents will handle more purchasing decisions
2. They need APIs, not browser automation
3. Whoever controls the checkout flow captures value

If you're building agents: UCP lets you complete transactions instead of handing off links.

If you're a merchant: UCP makes you AI-accessible but trades some brand control for reach.

If you're neither: watch Shopify's rollout. When 4M+ stores speak the same protocol, the ecosystem moves fast.