Cloudflare has unveiled a payment system intended to let artificial intelligence agents subscribe to online services and make purchases without a person having to approve every transaction.
The company announced Cloudflare Wallets on X and in a blog post. The service allows users to claim a wallet handle linked to their account and, in the near future, use the wallet to pay for application programming interfaces (APIs) and digital content.
An API is a set of rules that allows different software systems to communicate. Businesses frequently charge for access to APIs, but AI agents have generally lacked a straightforward way to identify themselves, complete a sign-up process and pay independently.
That limitation has become a barrier to the growth of what Cloudflare calls “agentic commerce” – a system in which software can make purchasing decisions and carry out transactions on behalf of people or organisations.
When an AI agent attempts to use a new online service, it often encounters a login or payment page designed for a human user. Without a simple way to verify its identity or provide payment details, the agent must usually stop and request assistance from a person.
Cloudflare’s new system separates wallets into two categories. Account Wallets are controlled by people, who can add funds, establish spending rules and withdraw money whenever they choose. Virtual Wallets are assigned to AI agents and operate through API keys rather than conventional login pages.
Each Virtual Wallet is linked to an Account Wallet and has a spending limit set by its owner. This means an agent can only use the amount it has been authorised to access.
For example, an employer could provide individual agents with Virtual Wallets limited to $100 per week for AI inference – the processing work carried out by an artificial intelligence model to produce answers. If an agent attempts to exceed its allowance, it must request a manual override from a human.
Cloudflare presents those limits as a way to give agents greater independence while maintaining control over expenditure. An agent authorised to spend $10 could independently test a large number of low-cost services, while one given responsibility for $1,000 would require more oversight.
The wallets use a payment technology called x402. It enables stablecoin micropayments to be attached directly to standard web requests. Stablecoins are digital currencies designed to maintain a relatively stable value, usually by being linked to the US dollar.
Cloudflare has also connected the wallet system to its Monetization Gateway, announced earlier this month. That service allows website and application operators to charge for access to content or APIs without developing separate payment infrastructure.
Cloudflare said the combination could produce what it describes as a “headless marketplace”, in which AI agents can discover, try and pay for services without a human being involved in every transaction.
Payment is not the only challenge facing autonomous agents online. Companies still have limited means of identifying whether website traffic comes from a person, a conventional bot or an AI agent working for a genuine customer.
Cloudflare is addressing that issue with cloudflare.pay, which can associate a wallet with an account and allow an agent to identify itself. An example could be an agent operating at research.example.cloudflare.pay. Identification will be optional, and merchants will decide whether to handle identified agents differently from anonymous traffic.
The company said the system builds on Web Bot Auth, which allows agents to establish an identity using a cryptographic keypair. The wallet handle is intended to turn that technical identity into a name that people can read and remember.
Cloudflare said the launch reflected the changing nature of internet traffic, with a majority now generated by bots rather than people. As AI agents become more involved in shopping, research and booking tasks, the company believes wallets, spending controls and optional identification could make transactions easier for both users and businesses.
The initial rollout will focus on adding and withdrawing funds in supported regions. Users will also be able to fund wallets themselves using stablecoins.
Cloudflare has not provided a complete timetable for live payments across all sites compatible with x402. Businesses and developers can claim a wallet handle now, with further information expected as identity standards from the x402 Foundation develop.
Cloudflare also said it is working with Visa, Mastercard, and American Express to create an authentication layer for “agentic commerce.”
