When ChatGPT first came out in November of 2022, it sparked the AI revolution. For the first time, millions of people could chat with AI and use it for school, work, or just curiosity. Since then, AI use has exploded. In 2026, around 1.1 billion people around the world are actively using AI tools.
In the U.S. alone, 194.9 million people actively use AI, and more than half of companies globally have already added it to their operations.
This post highlights AI usage through key statistics, covering everything from daily users to how students, professionals, and companies are adopting it.
TL;DR: Key Takeaways from AI Users (2026)
- In the U.S., 56% of people use AI, which is about 179 million Americans with internet access.
- 12% of active AI users in America use the technology daily with 6% using it multiple times.
- 60% of American school teachers use AI tools.
- 88% of companies worldwide are either already using AI or testing it out.
How Many People Use AI Around The World
As of January 2026, around 1.1 billion people actively use AI worldwide. That’s roughly 13.3% of the global population.
So how did we come up with this number? Well, ChatGPT alone has around 810 million weekly active users, making it a solid baseline for AI adoption. While many other AI tools add millions more users, there’s heavy overlap since people often use multiple tools. Adjusting for this overlap and including AI features inside everyday apps, the global number of active AI users is estimated at around 1.1 billion.
This means close to one in every ten people on Earth is now an AI user.
Out of 6 billion active internet users, only about 1.1 billion currently use AI. That leaves nearly 5 billion people online who haven’t adopted AI yet, showing how early the AI adoption curve still is.
Since AI is now being built directly into search engines, apps, browsers, and smartphones, future growth won’t rely on new internet users. Even if AI reaches just half of today’s internet population, it would add nearly 2 billion new users, making AI one of the fastest adoption shifts in tech history.
Number of AI Users In The United States
As of 2026, 56% of Americans use AI, which means 194.9 million Americans are actively using AI in their day to day lives. Moreover 28% of the U.S. population who use AI tools say they do so weekly.
On the other hand, 31% of Americans (99.2 million) say they have never used an AI tool before.
- American adults under 30 are much more likely to have used AI tools compared to older Americans, with 76% of younger adults saying they have tried them compared to 51% of those who are older. They are also more regular users, as half of American adults under 30 use AI at least once a week, while only about one in four older Americans do so.
- People with a college degree are also more frequent users of AI. About 37% of college graduates use AI weekly or more often, compared with 24% of Americans who do not have a college degree.
Sources: YouGov.
Number of Daily AI Users
In the U.S., 12% of active AI users use AI every day, and 6% use it multiple times a day. This equals about 23.4 million daily AI users, with around 11.7 million people using AI tools several times each day.
- Younger American adults are the most active users. Among those aged 18 to 29, 12% use AI multiple times a day and 9% use it daily.
- For ages 30 to 44, 10% report using AI multiple times a day and 7% use it daily.
- Among American AI users aged 45 to 64, 5% use it daily while only 2% use AI tools multiple times a day.
- Seniors 65 and older show the least activity, with 0% using AI multiple times daily and 3% using it daily.
Here is a table showing the frequency of AI usage among Americans:
| Frequency of AI Use | Share of U.S. AI Users |
|---|---|
| Multiple times per day | 6% |
| Daily | 6% |
| Multiple times per week | 10% |
| Weekly | 6% |
| Multiple times per month | 9% |
| Less frequently than monthly | 18% |
| Never | 31% |
Source: YouGov Survey.
How Many People Use AI in School
In 2026, 60% of American school teachers use AI tools. Usage is higher among high school teachers, with 66% using AI in school, and this adoption rises further to 69% among early-career teachers.
On the other hand, 86% of students worldwide now use AI in their studies, and more than half (54%) rely on it every week. ChatGPT is the most used AI tool among students with 66% of students primarily using it for their study purpose.
37% of students use AI to brainstorm and start their assignments. 33% use it to summarize content, and another 33% to find answers faster.
Number Of Companies Using AI In 2026
In 2026, around 88% of companies worldwide are either already using AI or testing it out. Since there are about 359 million companies globally, this means over 316 million of them are working with AI in some way.
More than half of these companies use AI to make their customer service better, while many also rely on it to improve cybersecurity. About 40% use AI to manage their inventory more effectively.
Here’s a table that shows the main areas where companies are using AI the most.
| Customer Service | 56% |
| Cybersecurity management | 51% |
| Chatbots | 47% |
| CRM | 46% |
| Inventory management | 40% |
| Content marketing | 35% |
| Product recommendations | 33% |
| Accounting | 30% |
| Supply chain managements | 30% |
| Human resource | 26% |
| Audience segmentation | 24% |
Source: Forbes.
Number of companies using Gen AI
About 79% of organizations using AI have applied generative AI in at least one area. Around 40% of them plan to increase their overall spending on AI, and 28% of leaders say that generative AI is already a topic on their board’s agenda.
Generative AI is used the most in marketing and sales, followed by product development and service operations.
| Company Function | Gen AI Usage |
|---|---|
| Marketing | 26.40% |
| Product Development | 24.50% |
| Service Operations | 18.90% |
| Risk | 7.50% |
| Strategy and Corporate Finance | 7.50% |
| HR | 5.70% |
| Supply Chain Management | 5.70% |
| Manufacturing | 3.80% |
Source: McKinsey.
Share of AI Users By Profession
Machine learning engineers use AI the most, with 56.2% of them working with it every day. Among data scientists, 45.1% use it daily. On average, about 36.5% of front-end developers and web designers also use AI every day.
Here is a table showing the percentage of IT professionals who use AI tools daily:
| Field of work | Share of users using AI daily |
|---|---|
| Machine Learning Engineer | 56.2% |
| Data scientist | 45.1% |
| Front-end developer | 37.2% |
| Web designer | 35.9% |
| Back-end developer | 35.4% |
| Full-stack developer | 34.7% |
Number Of Developers Who Use AI
About 96% of development teams use AI tools regularly, and more than half depend on them all the time. However, less than 10% review the code after generating it with AI, and 80% of developers don’t follow AI code security policies.
More insights from the survey:
- 9.7% of respondents said their team was automating 75% or more of security scans.
- Only 24.6% of survey respondents said their organizations used software composition analysis to verify the security of code suggestions from AI tools.
