The Home Depot and Google Cloud Launch Agentic AI Tools to Help Customers and Associates Bring Projects from 'How-to' to 'Done'

Expanded partnership introduces AI agents that go beyond advice to take action—giving customers project recommendations and managing complex material orders for pros

NEW YORK, Jan. 11, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Today at NRF 2026, The Home Depot and Google Cloud announced an expansion of their strategic partnership, further advancing the interconnected retail experience with new agentic AI tools that provide real-time, expert assistance to homeowners and professional customers (pros) like contractors, renovators and remodelers.

Through the deployment of Google Cloud's AI, The Home Depot is extending its home improvement expertise from the store aisles to customers' fingertips, including new capabilities in its Magic Apron assistant, AI-powered product list builders for pros, and new tools to improve customer and store support. By deploying Google Cloud's Gemini models and Gemini Enterprise for Customer Experience (CX), the company is creating a native "AI-first" experience that is personalized, contextual and available wherever the customer is—from the living room to the jobsite to the shelves.

Looking ahead, these capabilities will expand beyond The Home Depot's own platforms as the company participates in new, agentic shopping experiences across AI Mode in Google Search and the Gemini app in the coming months.

"The Home Depot has always been about providing excellent customer service," said Jordan Broggi, EVP Customer Experience and President – Online, The Home Depot. "By building on Google Cloud's AI solutions, we're putting 'Orange Apron' expertise in the pocket of every customer and creating an AI experience that is personalized, contextual, and available wherever the customer is—whether that's the home, the jobsite, or in the aisles of our stores."

"We are entering a new chapter of retail where technology doesn't just suggest products—it solves problems," said Jose Gomes, vice president, Retail & Consumer Packaged Goods at Google Cloud. "The Home Depot is leading in the agentic commerce era, and using AI to deliver real-world value. By integrating Google Cloud's AI, The Home Depot is ensuring that customer interactions—whether from a pro on a jobsite or a shopper in an aisle—are powered by the most sophisticated intelligence available today."

Magic Apron Assistant provides conversational home improvement recommendations and project expertise

The Home Depot significantly expanded its Magic Apron suite of AI tools, transforming them from a simple AI assistant on homedepot.com product pages into conversational, expert digital companions for DIYers and pros across Home Depot digital platforms. Customers can now describe their projects in plain language, and Magic Apron moves beyond simple search results to provide expert conversational advice and personalized recommendations for everything from how to fix a leaky faucet to full kitchen remodels. By integrating the Shopping agent from Gemini Enterprise for CX, The Home Depot is enhancing its Magic Apron platform which will soon have advanced multimodal capabilities, including image upload and visualization that allows the digital concierge to intuitively guide customers through complex home improvement projects.

The Home Depot also built a new store experience in Magic Apron, which integrates the agentic AI experience with real-time local store inventory and product locations—combining its proprietary home improvement knowledge and store wayfinding guidance right in a customer's pocket. As one of the first localized AI agents of its kind in retail, this expanded functionality provides aisle-level precision, directing customers to the exact bay for any item and offering technical guidance in the aisles. If a customer asks "What grout works best with glass tiles?" Magic Apron will not only provide how-to guides and recommend unsanded or epoxy grout, but it will also show the customer exactly where to find that product in the store and what additional materials the shopper may want to buy. Currently testing at select stores, the company plans to roll out this in-store experience nationwide in the coming months.

Accelerating pro workflows with AI-powered materials lists

For pro customers like renovators, remodelers, and contractors, The Home Depot will offer a new AI-powered materials list feature on its pro digital site. The new feature allows pros to describe a project via voice or text, or even upload a list of products the pro already has. The agent then interprets the project intent to quickly generate a comprehensive, grouped list of materials, even suggesting essential missed items required for the job—significantly accelerating the estimating and planning process for pros. Launched in beta in November 2025 and scaling nationally this month, these lists can help pros generate accurate quotes in a fraction of the time it used to take, so they can focus on bringing in new business more quickly and seamlessly.

Precision at the pavement with AI-powered route intelligence

The Home Depot built a smarter last mile with new route intelligence powered by Gemini and Google Maps Platform. This system predicts and prevents delivery failures by layering customer-specific data—like operating hours and drop-off preferences—with external factors like weather and road quality. Leveraging multimodal AI, the platform interprets Google Maps to spot potential access blockers such as narrow or unpaved streets, gated entries or posts that would make delivery or entry difficult. The new feature unlocks predictive capabilities to anticipate and mitigate delivery risks, ensuring a reliable and consistent customer experience. And by alerting drivers where large trucks may struggle to turn or offload, the system will soon be able to recommend the right equipment and crew size to ensure even the most complex sites receive on-time, complete deliveries.

Bringing a new level of customer service with AI-powered chat, SMS, and voice

The Home Depot is redefining how customers get help by replacing rigid, menu-driven automation with conversational AI that understands intent and resolves issues in real-time. Live today across SMS, chat and phone, the platform allows customers to speak naturally, eliminating the friction and dead ends common in traditional service experiences.

Powered by Gemini Enterprise for CX, the approach is already delivering materially better engagement and resolution outcomes, proving that conversational AI can move beyond deflection of issues to drive real customer impact at enterprise scale. Building on this momentum, The Home Depot is now testing next-generation AI voice agents in select stores, enabling associates to focus on the most complex customer needs.

Gemini Enterprise empowers associates at the Store Support Center

The Home Depot is one of the first companies to equip thousands of associates with Google Cloud's Gemini Enterprise, a new agentic platform that automates end-to-end business processes. At the company's Store Support Center, Gemini Enterprise equips teams with specialized agents to automate workflows in seconds, from more easily predicting project bottlenecks, to drafting marketing copy and auditing digital designs. By offloading routine execution, associates can focus on creative problem solving, high-impact strategy, and long-term growth.

About The Home Depot

The Home Depot is the world's largest home improvement specialty retailer.  At the end of the third quarter of fiscal 2025, the company operated a total of 2,356 retail stores and over 1,200 SRS locations across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, 10 Canadian provinces and Mexico. The Company employs over 470,000 associates. The Home Depot's stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: HD) and is included in the Dow Jones industrial average and Standard & Poor's 500 index.

About Google        

Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. Through products and platforms like Search, Maps, Gmail, Android, Google Play, Google Cloud, Chrome and YouTube, Google plays a meaningful role in the daily lives of billions of people and has become one of the most widely-known companies in the world. Google is a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc. 

SOURCE Google Cloud