• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer, Yesterday

Meta Platforms could add a new revenue stream to traditional advertising by focusing on brand search and transactions, rather than relying completely on advertising the company would move through its AI agent, "Muse."

This would add to its advertising revenue model, adding transaction fees and subscriptions.

At Meta Connect 2026 this week, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg laid out a new vision for Muse and the hardware built around it like smart glasses and a pocket-size device that doubles as a keychain charm.

“Meta framed the company’s AI strategy around controlling intelligence, making the case that broadly distributed models, including open weights, have advantages over closed systems,” Colin Sebastian, Baird Equity Research analyst, wrote in a research note published late Thursday night after attending Meta’s Connect developer sessions at its conference.

For advertisers, think of a future that relies on more than ads on a screen, but rather a visual search and location-based recommendations engine, voice assisted. Longer term, it potentially gives Meta more opt-in first-party behavioral data that could make ads more contextually relevant.

Privacy concerns without permission, however, could stand in the company’s way.

Muse could become a more significant play for advertisers. It is the AI agent that Meta is putting into its glasses. With voice capabilities, the idea is that a person wearing Meta glasses integrated with Muse can look at something like a shirt, and have the AI agent complete a purchase.

Meta’s Muse handles the transition through its app, but the user must have a Stripe account to link to Muse to make a one-time card purchase. The user tells Muse to buy something.

Muse finds the product, and before the purchase it shows the consumer the total price and the item, and asks the person to approve it.

Muse could become a new product-discovery interface. A woman could say, “I need a black dress for a Saturday evening dinner,” while wearing the glasses, and Muse could potentially research products, compare them and ultimately transact. Or the woman could say, “show me black dresses.”

A woman also could look at a dress and handbag she sees in a restaurant or storefront, and ask Muse to find it.

Transactions rather than advertising changes the brand-technology advertiser relationship. Instead of buying an impression, a brand may eventually need to make its products and services accessible to the AI agent, so Muse can select or transact with them.

This would put Meta in closer competition with Google and Amazon. The important asset would not be the display in Meta’s glasses, but owning the AI-mediated decision immediately before a purchase, and going directly to brand websites to complete the transaction.

Amazon has already blocked Muse from accessing its inventory, so brands would need to allow Muse to transact directly with them.

There also is another substantial roadblock. Meta says Muse conversations and data are not shared with Meta's ad systems. Using someone's private Muse conversations to target ads is not how Meta says the system works today.

Today, when combining Muse with glasses, brands get an AI-assisted discovery, recommendations and commerce engine, not a new conversational ad unit.

Potentially later, Meta could develop commercial and transaction relationships with brands and retailers inside Muse, where the economic model is closer to commerce media or affiliate and transaction revenue than traditional advertising.

It could shift advertising dollars from search and retail media toward AI-agent commerce.

At Meta Connect 2026 this week, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg laid out a new vision for Muse and the hardware built around it like smart glasses and a pocket-size device that doubles as a keychain charm.

“Meta framed the company’s AI strategy around controlling intelligence, making the case that broadly distributed models, including open weights, have advantages over closed systems,” Colin Sebastian, Baird Equity Research analyst, wrote in a research note published late Thursday night after attending Meta’s Connect developer sessions at its conference.

For advertisers, think of a future that relies on more than ads on a screen, but rather a visual search and location-based recommendations engine, voice assisted. Longer term, it potentially gives Meta more opt-in first-party behavioral data that could make ads more contextually relevant. Privacy concerns without permission, however, could stand in the company’s way.

Muse could become a more significant play for advertisers. It is the AI agent that Meta is putting into its glasses. With voice capabilities, the idea is that a person wearing Meta glasses integrated with Muse can look at something like a shirt, and have the AI agent complete a purchase.

Meta’s Muse handles the transition through its app, but the user must have a Stripe account to link to Muse to make a one-time card purchase. The user tells Muse to buy something. Muse finds the product, and before the purchase it shows the consumer the total price and the item, and asks the person to approve it.

Muse could become a new product-discovery interface. A woman could say, “I need a black dress for a Saturday evening dinner,” while wearing the glasses, and Muse could potentially research products, compare them and ultimately transact. Or the woman could say, “show me black dresses.” A woman also could look at a dress and handbag she sees in a restaurant or storefront, and ask Muse to find it.

Transactions rather than advertising changes the brand-technology advertiser relationship. Instead of buying an impression, a brand may eventually need to make its products and services accessible to the AI agent, so Muse can select or transact with them.

This would put Meta in closer competition with Google and Amazon. The important asset would not be the display in Meta’s glasses, but owning the AI-mediated decision immediately before a purchase, and going directly to brand websites to complete the transaction. Amazon has already blocked Muse from accessing its inventory, so brands would need to allow Muse to transact directly with them.

There also is another substantial roadblock. Meta says Muse conversations and data are not shared with Meta's ad systems. Using someone's private Muse conversations to target ads is not how Meta says the system works today.

Today, when combining Muse with glasses, brands get an AI-assisted discovery, recommendations and commerce engine, not a new conversational ad unit.

Potentially later, Meta could develop commercial and transaction relationships with brands and retailers inside Muse, where the economic model is closer to commerce media or affiliate and transaction revenue than traditional advertising.

It could shift advertising dollars from search and retail media toward AI-agent commerce.