SAN FRANCISCO – Instacart has introduced Smart Shop, an AI-powered feature designed to personalize and simplify the online grocery shopping experience. This new technology, combined with Health Tags and Inspiration Pages, aims to provide consumers with more informed and health-conscious choices while shopping.
Smart Shop leverages cutting-edge generative AI and machine learning to analyze consumer habits, dietary preferences, and purchasing behaviors. The system refines product recommendations by applying behavior analysis and affinity modeling, ensuring customers quickly find items that align with their needs. Smart Shop adapts dynamically as preferences evolve, fine-tuning its recommendations in real time.
Additionally, Smart Shop allows customers to customize their shopping experience with 14 unique dietary preferences, including gluten-free, high-protein, low-carb, and vegan options. Users can also specify household needs, such as shopping for babies, toddlers, or pets, further enhancing the personalization process.
"At Instacart, we want to turn the ordinary task of grocery shopping into a delightful, personalized shopping experience that takes the mental load out of finding the exact items that meet your preferences," said Daniel Danker, Chief Product Officer at Instacart. "By combining our new Smart Shop technology, Health Tags and Inspiration Pages, we're not just improving online grocery shopping – we're reimagining it, making it seamless to go from intention to action. By customizing your shopping journey to match your personal health goals or fit your dietary restrictions, we can unlock possibilities that weren't even on the table before."
Recognizing that over 70% of its users have dietary preferences, Instacart has introduced Health Tags, an AI-driven feature that scans and categorizes products based on key nutrition characteristics. Powered by vision-language models (VLMs), this technology extracts rich product attributes from text and images, enabling precise dietary labeling. Instacart has tagged over 1.3 billion data points across its catalog, covering products from more than 100,000 stores.
With 30 distinct Health Tags, including heart-healthy, keto, preservative-free, and non-GMO options, consumers can easily filter items based on their dietary needs, facilitating healthier and more informed choices.
Instacart is further enhancing its health-focused offerings with Inspiration Pages, curated destinations that feature expert-backed nutrition advice and shoppable recipes. The first Inspiration Page, developed in collaboration with the American Diabetes Association (ADA), provides diabetes-friendly grocery recommendations and evidence-based nutrition guidance.
Nearly half of American adults manage a chronic disease linked to diet, so these pages offer a convenient way to access trusted nutrition information. Instacart plans to expand the Inspiration Pages to cover additional dietary goals, such as high fiber and protein, while forming new partnerships to bring more expert-backed insights to consumers.
"Instacart is making it easier for people to shop for nutritious foods that support their health goals and lifestyle. With Smart Shop technology and Health Tags, we're giving consumers the power to personalize their experience, with tools to filter and discover the best options for their unique preferences," said Sarah Mastrorocco, Vice President and General Manager of Instacart Health. "Our collaboration with the American Diabetes Association takes this a step further by turning expert nutrition advice into easy, shoppable solutions through our Inspiration Pages. Whether you're managing a chronic condition like diabetes or simply looking to make more informed food choices, we're here to help make grocery shopping simpler and more personalized."
Instacart’s partnership with the ADA also extends to healthcare organizations, enabling providers to utilize Instacart Health Fresh Funds to purchase nutritious foods that meet diabetes care standards. This initiative enhances patient access to healthy foods, incorporating nutrition into the management of chronic diseases on a large scale.
