Generative AI use is getting more mainstream in America
The Ipsos Consumer Tracker asks Americans questions about culture, the economy and the forces that shape our lives. Here's one thing we learned this week.
Why we asked: AI is everywhere. But the U.S. is also an outlier in many ways, both in terms of leading in development and skepticism of its users. It was time to check in on this again.
What we found: Overall, frequent usage of AI chatbot-like tools is flat in the U.S. Last November, just under six in ten people who said they are familiar with AI tools in a previous question said they used these tools often or sometimes. Now, that number is virtually unchanged since November 2025. [Note, we did update the list of examples to a more current suite of tools like Copilot and Gemini.]
What has shifted is the regularity. One in four (24%) now say they use these tools “often,” up from 17% last fall. Meanwhile, the number of people who say they never use AI tools has fallen from 26% to 17%, as more people say they use AI at least “rarely.”
So more people are using AI tools, and the number of those using them often is on the upswing. This provides more evidence of a surge in “power users” who are outpacing those who aren’t fully invested.
