Why it matters

Agent payments are foundational for agents that take real actions. Without a standard, every merchant integration is bespoke. AP2 aims to make this pluggable.

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The architecture

Roles: Payer Agent (user's agent making payment), Merchant Agent (accepting payment), Wallet (holds payment methods and authorizes).

Extends A2A: uses same transport and message types.

AP2 rolesPayer Agentuser's agentMerchant AgentsellerWalletuser's payment sourceAP2 layers on top of A2A; leverages same auth and transport patterns
Payment participants.
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How it works end to end

Flow: merchant sends payment request; payer agent authorizes via wallet; wallet returns payment token; payer sends token to merchant; merchant validates and settles.

Security: user consent required for each payment (or delegated authority within limits).

Underlying rails: works with card networks, ACH, digital wallets, crypto.