# eCommerce AI Agent Maturity Model

Companion to **The eCommerce AI Agent Maturity Model: From Chatbot to Autonomous Operations**.

This is a **program** maturity model. It is **not** the per-action autonomy table in [`autonomy-spectrum-by-action.md`](autonomy-spectrum-by-action.md). A company can be Level 3 overall and still keep refunds at Request Approval.

**Do not treat Level 5 as the goal.** Most merchants should stop at Level 3 or 4.

| Level | Name | Capability | Business value | Data | Integration | Risk | Governance | Human |
| ----- | ---- | ---------- | -------------- | ---- | ----------- | ---- | ---------- | ----- |
| **1** | AI Assistant | Answers from docs / KB | Deflect FAQ | Policy docs | None or KB only | Hallucinated policy | Prompt + Guardrails | Human does all work |
| **2** | AI-Assisted workflow | Drafts; human clicks | Faster tickets | One domain reads | One API family | Draft error | Human is the control | Human executes |
| **3** | AI Copilot | Recommends with evidence_tool | Better decisions | Joined reads | Named read tools | Wrong recommendation | Evals; no unbounded writes | Human decides |
| **4** | AI Agent | Calls allowed tools; HITL over cap | Closed loops on bounded actions | Fresh domain data | Gateway + Cedar | Wrong write under cap | Policy ENFORCE + goldens | HITL on money/ATP/price/account |
| **5** | Multi-agent operations | Supervisor + specialists | Cross-domain investigation | Shared data layer | Many tools; hop caps | Coordination failure | Per-agent Identity; hop limits | Supervisor + specialists + HITL |

## Where to sit (opinionated default)

| Merchant shape | Target this year | Do not |
| -------------- | ---------------- | ------ |
| HTML catalog, no OMS API | Level 1–2 | Shopping copilot |
| Shopify + helpdesk APIs, named owner | Level 3 | Multi-agent |
| Gateway tools, Cedar LOG_ONLY done, evals owned | Level 4 on **one** domain | Level 5 “ops team” |
| Multiple domains, hop caps needed | Level 5 **after** Level 4 works | Swarm as week-one architecture |

## Promotion rule

Promote **one level** after: goldens pass, owner named, blast-radius veto still holds. Skipping 3 → 5 is how a polite FAQ bot gets `createReturn`.

## Related

- Autonomy per action: [`autonomy-spectrum-by-action.md`](autonomy-spectrum-by-action.md)
- When to split agents: [`multi-agent-when-to-split.md`](multi-agent-when-to-split.md)
- Roadmap phases: [`ai-agent-roadmap-phasing.md`](ai-agent-roadmap-phasing.md)