Show HN: WhatToBuy – Describe your situation, get AI-curated shopping carts

Before reading text please try the app https://www.whattobuy.app (to get great UX feedback)

Shopping research is one of the most challenging tasks and people spend 30-60 min before buying an item. We developed a platform called “WhatToBuy” to save people time. In some cases shoppers are not super aware of what to really order for a trip or occasion. Our app helps them to get a range of products needed for each use-cases hence saving time and money.

App workflow: Describe your situation in plain English. In Fast mode, you get three ready-to-shop carts: Budget, Balanced, and Premium with real products, real prices, and direct buy links. In Deep mode, AI assistant has a conversation with you first and builds a single cart tailored specifically to your answers.

How it works: * You type something like "camping weekend with two young kids" or "setting up a home office on a tight budget" * AI assistant (powered by Claude) parses the scenario and generates a list of specific product search queries. For example, in the above query for camping, product search will be "tent 4-person easy setup" instead of simply "tent". * Those queries hit Shopping API and return real-time results. * A scoring layer ranks by price, rating, and review count to pick one winner per product category per tier.

Two modes: * Deep (default): AI assistant asks a few follow up questions before building a single personalized cart. We default to this because more context means dramatically better picks. Sign in is required for this mode, but you can always drop back to Fast mode with one click. * Fast: Instant three-tier carts, no sign in needed, works right away.

Please take a look: https://www.whattobuy.app No account needed to try the fast mode. Would love feedback on where the recommendations miss or where the UX feels off.

2 points | by crackeddude 2 hours ago

1 comments

  • patrakov 39 minutes ago
    You need to filter out unavailable and obsolete products.

    My prompt (in Fast mode, as a guest):

    """ I need to take a trip to Turkey for a week. I would like to take a camera with me, but my Nikon Coolpix P1100 is too heavy for that (1.5 kg). I do need some zoom, let's say up to 250 mm but the exact maximum focal length is negotiable. """

    The model seemingly failed to realize that the request is about a high-zoom compact camera. Only one of three different suggestions featured a compact camera, "Canon - PowerShot ELPH 360 HS - A Full HD Video 20.2-Megapixel Digital Camera - Black", on BestBuy (https://www.bestbuy.com/product/p/J7C86SHZLX), and it's unavailable there. So, zero success, but the 10-year-old camera suggested does fit the bill if still available from elsewhere.