--- title: "AP2 vs Verifiable Intent: sourced differences | Agent Ready Checkout" description: "AP2 vs Verifiable Intent: AP2 defines the mandate flow between agent, merchant and credential provider. Verdicts by reader type." canonical: https://agentreadycheckout.com/compare/ap2-vs-verifiable-intent site: "Agent Ready Checkout" last_updated: 2026-11-04 section: "Head-to-heads" --- # AP2 vs Verifiable Intent: sourced differences | Agent Ready Checkout > AP2 vs Verifiable Intent: AP2 defines the mandate flow between agent, merchant and credential provider. Verdicts by reader type. Source: https://agentreadycheckout.com/compare/ap2-vs-verifiable-intent Site: Agent Ready Checkout Last reviewed: 2026-11-04 Head-to-head # AP2 vs Verifiable Intent In short AP2 defines the mandate flow between agent, merchant and credential provider; Verifiable Intent defines a credential format (layered SD-JWT) for the same delegation, co-developed by Mastercard and Google and aligned with AP2. On Adyen the matrix reads AP2 announced and Verifiable Intent no statement found, and the two split on 9 more columns. ## The sourced difference AP2 defines the mandate flow between agent, merchant and credential provider; Verifiable Intent defines a credential format (layered SD-JWT) for the same delegation, co-developed by Mastercard and Google and aligned with AP2. Both went to the FIDO Payments working group on 28 Apr 2026. [fidoalliance.org](https://fidoalliance.org/fido-alliance-to-develop-standards-for-trusted-ai-agent-interactions/), read 4 Nov 2026. ## Verdicts by reader type Head of ecommerce engineering Expect VI credentials inside AP2-style flows; do not build both separately. Payments lead Both are evidence formats; neither changes liability. ## Side by side | Measure | AP2 | Verifiable Intent | | --- | --- | --- | | Kind | Protocol | Protocol | | Operator | FIDO Alliance (donated by Google, April 2026) | Mastercard, with Google; contributed to FIDO Alliance | | Homepage | ap2-protocol.org | verifiableintent.dev | | Matrix cells with a stated status | 0 live, 1 pilot, 10 announced | 0 live, 1 pilot, 0 announced | | Published pricing | No pricing statement on file | No pricing statement on file | | A limit worth knowing | Does not carry the payment itself: it wraps cards, x402 or other rails. | Does not move funds. | | Merchant of record | Merchant | N/a | | Dispute rules | Evidence only | Evidence only | | Live surfaces | None confirmed | None | | Cost | No protocol fee | No fee | ## Column by column: where the statuses differ 10 of 27 columns read differently for AP2 and Verifiable Intent on 4 Nov 2026. | Column | AP2 | Verifiable Intent | | --- | --- | --- | | Adyen | announced | no statement found | | PayPal | announced | no statement found | | Worldpay | announced | no statement found | | Coinbase | announced | no statement found | | Crossmint | announced | no statement found | | Shopify | announced | no statement found | | Salesforce CC | announced | no statement found | | Adobe Commerce | announced | no statement found | | Etsy | announced | no statement found | | Google AI Mode | announced | no statement found | | | | 10 differences | | | ## Read the profiles - [Agent Payments Protocol (AP2)](https://agentreadycheckout.com/protocols/ap2) - [Verifiable Intent (VI)](https://agentreadycheckout.com/protocols/verifiable-intent) ## Sources 1. [FIDO Alliance to develop standards for trusted AI agent interactions](https://fidoalliance.org/fido-alliance-to-develop-standards-for-trusted-ai-agent-interactions/), read 4 Nov 2026 2. [AP2 protocol site](https://ap2-protocol.org/), read 4 Nov 2026 3. [verifiableintent.dev](https://verifiableintent.dev/), read 4 Nov 2026 4. [cloud.google.com/blog/products/ai-machine-learning/announcing-agents-to-payments-ap2-protocol](https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/ai-machine-learning/announcing-agents-to-payments-ap2-protocol), read 4 Nov 2026 5. [AP2 releases](https://github.com/google-agentic-commerce/AP2/releases), read 4 Nov 2026 6. [mastercard.com/us/en/news-and-trends/stories/2026/verifiable-intent.html](https://www.mastercard.com/us/en/news-and-trends/stories/2026/verifiable-intent.html), read 4 Nov 2026 7. [Verifiable Intent repository](https://github.com/agent-intent/verifiable-intent), read 4 Nov 2026 Last reviewed 4 Nov 2026 ## Edition Matrix edition of 4 Nov 2026. Reviewed 4 Nov 2026, [7 sources](#sources-h). ## Method [How cells, sources and read dates are defined](https://agentreadycheckout.com/method)