AI spending booming but who’s using it
Worldwide spending on AI will reach close to $1.5 trillion in 2025 and $2 trillion next year, led in large part by AI being integrated into products such as smartphones and PCs, as well as infrastructure, market research firm Gartner says. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has said that “growth in the use of AI services has been astonishing” while others say business adoption of AI is slow. A new study finds steady growth in work-related ChatGPT messages but even faster growth in non-work-related messages.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT consumer product was launched in November 2022 and by July 2025, it had been adopted by around 10% of the world’s adult population.
“Early adopters were disproportionately male but the gender gap has narrowed dramatically, and we find higher growth rates in lower-income countries”, says a study by researchers at Duke University and Harvard University in the US.
“We find steady growth in work-related messages but even faster growth in non-work-related messages, which have grown from 53% to more than 70% of all usage. Work usage is more common for educated users in highly-paid professional occupations.”
The study classified messages by conversation topic and found that “Practical Guidance,” “Seeking Information,” and “Writing” are the three most common topics and collectively account for nearly 80% of all conversations.
“Writing dominates work-related tasks, highlighting chatbots’ unique ability to generate digital outputs compared to traditional search engines. Computer programming and self-expression both represent relatively small shares of use.”
“Overall, we find that ChatGPT provides economic value through decision support, which is especially important in knowledge-intensive jobs”, the study says.
“Within work usage, we find that users currently appear to derive value from using ChatGPT as an advisor or research assistant, not just a technology that performs job tasks directly.”
“Still, ChatGPT likely improves worker output by providing decision support, which is especially important in knowledge-intensive jobs where productivity is increasing in the quality of decision-making”, according to the study by Duke and Harvard universities.
The Gartner forecast assumes continued investment in AI infrastructure expansion, as major hyperscalers continue to increase investments in data centres.
“The AI investment landscape is also expanding beyond traditional US tech giants, including Chinese companies and new AI cloud providers. Furthermore, venture capital investment in AI providers is providing additional tailwinds for AI spending”, says Gartner VP Analyst John-David Lovelock.
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