What’s live
As of 27 October 2026. Stages are judged by fixed criteria, not by vendor wording.
Stage criteria
- announced: The owner has publicly announced the capability. No production availability, even limited, has been verified.
- early-access: Available to developers or partners on an application, waitlist or invitation basis, with APIs, a toolkit or a sandbox, ahead of general availability.
- live: Generally available in production for its stated market, with real transactions occurring outside a closed pilot.
- pilot: Real transactions or production use with a named, limited set of participants: first or controlled transactions, closed group, not generally available.
- standard: The specification is governed by a neutral standards body or foundation under open governance, with a published specification. Versioned development may continue.
Visa Intelligent Commerce
Stage: live since unverified
Stage judged live on the strength of Visa's reported US transactions and the June 2026 general availability of the Connect on-ramp, but no precise live date could be verified in sources consulted, so stage_start_date is unverified rather than asserted.
Stage history
- announced (2025-04-30): Program announced at Visa Global Product Drop.
- pilot (2026-04-08): Intelligent Commerce Connect announced (pilot partners).
Sources: MeshPay: Agentic Payment Protocols Compared (Visa live in US, per Visa), Money in Motion: June Market Recap 2026 (Connect general availability within June 2026), Digital Commerce 360: Visa opens payment tools for AI agents (launch)
Visa Agent Score
Stage: announced since 2026-06-10
A merchant-facing readiness check for whether agents can navigate and complete tasks on a site (built with New Generation, per press coverage). No general-availability or production-use evidence was found in sources consulted.
Stage history
- announced (2026-06-10): Introduced at Visa Payments Forum, San Francisco.
Sources: thesoftix: Agentic Commerce for SMBs in 2026 (Agent Score, Agentic Directory), TechSoma: Visa and OpenAI Partner (Agent Score, Agentic Directory)
Visa Agentic Directory
Stage: pilot since 2026-10-20
Registry of Visa-verified agents and merchants. Announced June 10, 2026; first production use verified in the October 20, 2026 BILL pilot, where the BILL Payment Agent registers via TAP and the Agentic Directory.
Stage history
- announced (2026-06-10): Introduced at Visa Payments Forum, San Francisco.
- pilot (2026-10-20): Used for agent registration in the Visa/BILL/Billtrust live pilot.
Sources: thesoftix: Agentic Commerce for SMBs in 2026 (Agent Score, Agentic Directory), Visa press release: Visa, BILL and Billtrust first live pilot
Visa / BILL / Billtrust first live pilot
Stage: pilot since 2026-10-20
Trusted AI agents initiate and complete approved buyer invoice payments end-to-end through supplier portals. Announced as a live pilot, explicitly not a full commercial rollout; buyers set payment instructions and controls, suppliers retain acceptance rules and visibility.
Stage history
- pilot (2026-10-20): First live pilot announced in Las Vegas; pilot processes transactions involving participating BILL buyers and Billtrust suppliers.
Sources: Visa press release: Visa, BILL and Billtrust first live pilot, Billtrust: AI Agents for Payments, BILL press release: Visa, BILL and Billtrust first live pilot
Mastercard Agent Pay
Stage: live since 2025-11
General availability is US-wide; global expansion was reported as underway through 2026. The live date is month precision only: full US availability was reported for November 2025, but the exact day was not verified in sources consulted.
Stage history
- announced (2025-04-29): Program announced (Mastercard Newsroom).
- pilot (2025-09): Citi and US Bank cardholders gain first access (pilot).
- live (2025-11): Full US availability for cardholders (month precision).
Sources: Mastercard Newsroom: Agent Pay launch, eco.com: Agentic Payments (Agent Pay rollout: pilot, PayPal, US availability)
Mastercard Agent Pay for Machines (AP4M)
Stage: early-access since 2026-10-20
Developer opening, not general availability. The program itself is still described as pilot stage for commercial availability; the October 2026 step opened it to developers, not to general commercial use.
Stage history
- pilot (2026-06-10): Launched with 30+ initial participants; end-to-end pilots with Cloudflare, Coinbase, Base, Ant International, BVNK and AIsa.
- early-access (2026-10-20): Early developer access opened at Cloudflare Connect, San Francisco: buyer- and seller-side APIs, developer toolkit, testing sandbox. Demonstration: one agent made 9 payments to 2 merchants under one approved budget, running on x402.
Sources: Agentic Plug: What Is Mastercard Agent Pay for Machines (AP4M)?, MeshPay: Agentic Payment Protocols Compared, Crypto Briefing: Mastercard opens early access at Cloudflare Connect, PaySpace Magazine: Mastercard Opens Early Access to Agent Pay for Machines, Coin360: Mastercard Opens AI Agent Payments to Developers
Santander Europe first live agent payment
Stage: pilot since 2026-03-02
Controlled-environment transaction on Santander's live payments infrastructure within a regulated banking framework; Santander stated it would move into extended testing and scaling. Judged pilot, not general availability, on the issuer's own characterization.
Stage history
- pilot (2026-03-02): Europe's first live end-to-end payment executed by an AI agent, announced in London and Madrid.
Sources: Mastercard Newsroom: Santander and Mastercard complete Europe's first live agent payment, Forkast: Seven Months After Europe's First Agent Payment
Mastercard Agent Pay Trust Framework
Stage: announced since 2026-09-30
Judged announced, not live: the framework is a published document (white paper 'Trust for agentic commerce') whose component services were announced the same day. The AI-initiated probability score is in US testing, not general availability; Cloudflare and Skyfire partnerships support verification work. A framework document has no general-availability date of its own.
Stage history
- announced (2026-09-30): White paper published; five pillars (identity, intent, controls, trusted execution, intelligence); new trust and intelligence services announced.
Sources: Mastercard Investor Relations: Trust and Intelligence Services (2026-09-30), Banking News AI: Mastercard AI Strategy (timeline)
Google Agent Payments Protocol (AP2)
Stage: standard since 2026-04-28
Judged standard because governance moved to a neutral body (FIDO Alliance, two technical working groups) with a published specification; version development continues (v0.2 is the latest verified version).
Stage history
- announced (2025-09-16): Announced by Google with 60+ organizations.
- standard (2026-04-28): v0.2 released and donated to the FIDO Alliance.
Sources: inriver: What are AP2, MPP, and x402?, MeshPay: Agentic Payment Protocols Compared
x402
Stage: live since 2025-05-06
Production transaction volume is reported by multiple independent trackers (Chainalysis: 100M+ cumulative transactions on Base through Q1 2026; foundation dashboard: ~75M transactions and ~$24M volume in the trailing 30 days at July 2026, a vendor figure). Mainnet went live the same day as the protocol launch.
Stage history
- live (2025-05-06): Coinbase launch; mainnet live the same day.
Sources: eco.com: x402 Protocol Explained, Yellow: AI Agent Payments Explained (x402, AP2, stablecoins), Concordium: x402 Explained
x402 Foundation
Stage: standard since 2026-07-14
Neutral governance under the Linux Foundation. Announced September 23, 2025 (Coinbase and Cloudflare); formalized April 2, 2026; operationally launched July 14, 2026 with 40 member organizations.
Stage history
- announced (2025-09-23): Foundation plans announced by Coinbase and Cloudflare.
- standard (2026-07-14): Operational launch under the Linux Foundation, 40 members.
Sources: Linux Foundation press release: operational launch of the x402 Foundation, Concordium: x402 Explained