Protocols

AP2

AP2 is the Agentic Payment Protocol. Version 0.2 defines signed checkout and payment mandates so a merchant, a network, or a payment processor can verify that an agent is allowed to buy and pay. AP2 does not define its own settlement ledger. Funds move on whatever rail the mandate names.

Explanation

The specification describes AP2 as a security feature inside a commerce protocol, and says it is built to work with the Universal Commerce Protocol. A shopping agent assembles the checkout, a trusted surface signs the mandates, and the merchant or payment actor verifies them. A closed checkout mandate is bound to a merchant-signed checkout JWT by a hash. A payment mandate is bound to that same checkout. Open mandates carry constraints instead of one cart, including budget, amount range, allowed payee, allowed instrument, and recurrence. Each mandate type has a vct value such as mandate.checkout.1 or mandate.payment.open.1.

A valid mandate is evidence of authorization. It is not evidence that money moved. If the rail under the mandate is x402, the onchain USDC transfer is already in the x402 series and is not counted again as AP2. The AP2 row on the protocols page is metadata for that reason. The x402 extension spec describes how an AP2-style flow can ride on x402, which is still an x402 settlement from this index's point of view.