Global AI Adoption in 2025: A Widening Digital Divide

Global adoption of artificial intelligence continued to rise in the second half of 2025, increasing by 1.2 percentage points compared to the first half of the year. Roughly one in six people worldwide are now using generative AI tools — remarkable progress for a technology that only recently entered mainstream use.

Despite progress in AI adoption, the data shows a widening divide. Adoption in the Global North grew nearly twice as fast as in the Global South. As a result, 24.7 per cent of the working-age population in the Global North is now using these tools, compared with only 14.1 per cent in the Global South.

To track this trend, we measure AI diffusion as the share of people worldwide who have used a generative AI product during the reported period. This measure is derived from aggregated and anonymised Microsoft telemetry and adjusted to reflect differences in operating system and device market share, internet penetration and country population.

No single metric is perfect, and this one is no exception. Through the Microsoft AI Economy Institute, we continue to refine how we measure AI diffusion globally, including how adoption varies across countries in ways that best advance priorities such as scientific discovery and productivity gains. For this report, we rely on the strongest cross-country measure available today and expect to complement it over time with additional indicators as they emerge and mature.