OfferUp and Albatross Strike Long-Term AI Discovery Deal After Pilot Boosts Feed Engagement 84%

OfferUp, the Bellevue, Washington-based mobile marketplace, has entered a long-term partnership with Swiss AI firm Albatross to roll out real-time adaptive discovery technology across its platform, the two companies announced on 23 September 2026.

The agreement follows a pilot in which Albatross's so-called perception models replaced OfferUp's legacy recommendation system — which had been built on popularity and recency signals — with a technology the company says interprets and responds to individual user behaviour as it unfolds within a session. According to the announcement, every user action reshapes the homepage feed in real time.

Results from an initial A/B test showed homepage feed engagement rising 84%, listing views across the entire platform increasing 19%, and total purchase intentions — defined as qualified buyers reaching out to sellers — climbing 15%, with homepage feed engagements up 61%. The companies said each metric increased week over week throughout the test.

During the pilot, the subset of OfferUp buyers whose experience was powered by Albatross discovered an additional three million unique listings, and engagements within that group increased by 15%. Albatross CEO Dr. Kevin Kahn said the system also connected buyers with 131,000 additional sellers within three weeks.

OfferUp Chief Business Officer Nathan Garnett said the results from the first weeks of the pilot were "exceptional" and described the technology as making the OfferUp experience "more dynamic and personalized." Scott Greenberg, OfferUp's VP of Advertising and Partnerships, highlighted the speed of deployment, noting the company went "from kickoff to a live experiment in weeks."

The partnership extends Albatross's footprint beyond its existing relationship with Wallapop, one of Europe's largest consumer-to-consumer marketplaces, where the firm has deployed its technology across Spain, Italy, and Portugal. Albatross says its platform currently powers the online experience of more than 50 million shoppers monthly and processes more than three billion user interactions per month across more than 150 million products.

Albatross is based in Switzerland and backed by investors Redalpine, MMC Ventures, and Daphni. OfferUp was founded in 2011 and, according to the announcement, was used by more than one in six adults in the U.S. in 2024.