How many companies use AI: the official figures by country, size and sector

In the two weeks from 5 to 18 October 2026, 24.6% of US businesses said they had used artificial intelligence (AI) in one of their business functions [1]. The US Census Bureau published that figure on 22 October 2026. For businesses with 250 or more employees, the share was 43.6% [2]. In the European Union (EU), 55.03% of enterprises with 250 or more employees used AI in 2025 [10].

This page gives the newest official figure from each of four statistics offices, with the question each office asked, the businesses it counted and the dates. It then explains why private surveys give higher numbers. It is part of the guide on enterprise AI adoption.

The United States: the Census Bureau's survey

The Business Trends and Outlook Survey (BTOS) is the Census Bureau's survey of US businesses. By the Census Bureau's description, its sample of 1.2 million businesses is split into six panels. Data is collected every two weeks, and each panel is asked to report once every 12 weeks [5]. The AI question asks whether the business used AI in any of its business functions in the last two weeks.

A note on the name. Executive Order 14434, signed on 29 September 2026, tells US executive agencies to write "Super Intelligence" and "SI" in place of "Artificial Intelligence" and "AI" [4]. Because of that order, the Census Bureau now calls its AI figures "Super Intelligence" or "SI": its files say "As of October 22, 2026, data is published in compliance with Executive Order 14434" [1]. The survey question asked about "Artificial Intelligence (AI)" until the collection that began on 19 October 2026 [5]. Every figure on this page was collected before that date, so this page says AI.

By company size

The size file gives the share of businesses using AI for each size class, and the national file gives the share for all businesses. The four most recent periods read as follows [1][2].

Employees	5 to 18 Oct 2026	Period before	Two periods before	Three periods before
1 to 4	24.3%	23.9%	23.8%	23.6%
100 to 249	35.3%	36.4%	34.1%	34.5%
250 or more	43.6%	36.5%	44.0%	38.4%
All businesses	24.6%	23.8%	23.8%	23.2%

The large-firm figure moves more than the others. A standard error measures how far a survey estimate could be from the true figure because only a sample of businesses answered. The standard error for firms with 250 or more employees in the latest period is 1.51 percentage points, against 0.27 points for all businesses [2][1]. Between neighbouring periods, the large-firm figure moved by up to 7.5 points. Reveneau's view is that a board should read the large-firm figure as a range across several periods, and should not read a change between two periods as a trend.

In the same October period, 28.6% of all businesses said they expected to use AI in the next six months [1].

Two breaks in the series

The question has changed twice. On 17 November 2025 the Census Bureau changed the wording from AI use "in producing goods or services" to AI use in any of the business's functions. The level jumped, so the Bureau started a new series: "Due to a level shift observed in conjunction with the new question wording, the decision was made to create a new time series for the AI questions, beginning with data released on December 4, 2025" [6]. A figure from before November 2025 cannot be compared with a later one.

Within the new series, the share of all businesses using AI rose from 17.3% in the period collected 17 to 30 November 2025 to 24.6% in October 2026 [1]. A Census Bureau story of 26 May 2026 said that from December 2025 to May 2026 "overall AI usage hovered between 17% and 20%". The same story gave an example by size: "37% of firms with at least 250 employees reported using AI in their business operations" [7].

The second change came with the executive order. The data page says the wording was updated because of Executive Order 14434 "Beginning with the October 19 2026 collection" [5]. The period of 5 to 18 October 2026 is the last one collected before that change. The next releases may show another break, so check the Census notes before comparing them with the figures on this page.

By sector

The sector file uses industry codes. For the three codes checked against the Census Bureau's own story, the shares for 5 to 18 October 2026 were: information, 46.4%; finance and insurance, 40.5%; retail trade, 18.5% [3]. The Census story gave 39.7% for information and 33.9% for finance and insurance in the period ending 3 May 2026, and put retail trade at 14% in rounded terms [7]. A bank or insurer should also read the guide on AI in banking.

A second Census question shows a gap inside large firms

The Census Bureau also ran a longer AI supplement, collected 17 November 2025 to 8 February 2026 [8]. In it, 30.6% of respondents at firms with 250 or more employees said the firm had used AI in the last two weeks, and 22.9% said they did not know [8]. The supplement ran over different weeks from the October figure, so the two shares should not be compared. Reveneau reads the 22.9% as a sign that, in a large company, the person who answers a survey cannot always see all the AI the company uses. Managers inside the company can have the same limited view, which is why the first 90 days checklist starts with an inventory.

Other US surveys disagree

A Federal Reserve Board note of 3 April 2026 cites earlier work by Crane, Green and Soto (2025), who examined 16 surveys of AI use in the US. As of mid-2024, the surveys' estimates of work-related AI adoption ranged from 5 to 40 percent [9]. The note gives several reasons the estimates differ: which sizes of firm a survey samples, how the question is framed, whether the person answering knows the firm's AI use, and pressure on senior leaders to report AI use [9].

The European Union: Eurostat

Eurostat, the EU's statistics office, counts enterprises with 10 or more employees and self-employed persons. Its 2025 figures come from surveys held by national statistics offices in the first months of 2025. In 2025 it surveyed 157,000 of the 1.53 million enterprises in the EU [10]. Its main figure is the share that used at least one AI technology.

Enterprises	Share using AI in 2025	Source
All with 10 or more employees	19.95%	[10]
Small (10 to 49 employees)	17%	[10]
Medium (50 to 249 employees)	30.36%	[10]
Large (250 or more employees)	55.03%	[10]
All, in 2024	13.48%	[11]
Large, in 2021	28.41%	[11]

The share for all enterprises rose by 6.47 percentage points from 2024 to 2025 [10]. The share for large enterprises went from 28.41% in 2021 to 55.03% in 2025 [11].

The highest country share is eight times the lowest. "The highest share was recorded in Denmark (42.03%), followed by Finland (37.82%) and Sweden (35.04%), while the lowest shares were recorded in Romania (5.21%), Poland (8.36%) and Bulgaria (8.55%)" [10]. Sectors differ too. The information and communication sector led at 62.52%, followed by professional, scientific and technical activities at 40.43%, and in every other sector the share was below 25% [10]. Construction was lowest, at 10.79% [10].

Finance and insurance is outside the list of sectors Eurostat covers [10], so a bank or insurer in the EU has no Eurostat figure for its own sector. The EU's target is that "By 2030, three out of four EU companies should use cloud computing services, big data or artificial intelligence" [10].

The United Kingdom: the Office for National Statistics

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) asks businesses about AI in its Business Insights and Conditions Survey (BICS). In the wave that ran from 21 September to 4 October 2026, 30% of all UK businesses and 38% of businesses with 10 or more employees used at least one AI technology [12]. The 38% is "up 3 percentage points from June 2026 and 26 percentage points from September 2023" [12]. The information and communication industry was highest, at 60% [12].

The September bulletin gives 51% for the largest businesses, but it labels that group "250 or more employees" in one place and "100 or more employees" in another [12]. This page uses the June 2026 figure instead: 49% of UK businesses with 250 or more employees used AI, against 28% of those with 0 to 9 employees [13].

Two further ONS points matter to a large company. Among UK businesses with 10 or more employees that use AI, "only 10% report using AI extensively", from a new question in June 2026 that the ONS asks readers to treat as early indications [13]. And BICS leaves out some industries, including "public administration and defence, public provision of education and health, and finance and insurance" [13]. Banks, insurers and public bodies are outside the UK figure.

Canada: Statistics Canada

Statistics Canada asks whether a business used AI to produce goods or deliver services in the 12 months before the survey. The survey ran from 1 April to 6 May 2026, with 9,251 responses from a sample of 21,105 [14].

Group	Share using AI in the last 12 months	Source
All businesses, 2026	19.2%	[14]
All businesses, 2025	12.2%	[14]
All businesses, 2024	6.1%	[14]
Businesses with 100 or more employees	27.8%	[14]
Information and cultural industries	42.3%	[14]
Finance and insurance	40.4%	[14]

Statistics Canada also reports that 40.0% of businesses "indicated the use of AI is not relevant to the business" [14].

Private counts are higher

The 2026 AI Index from Stanford University's Institute for Human-Centered AI says organisational AI adoption rose "up to 88% of surveyed organizations" in 2025, and that 70% used generative AI in at least one business function [15]. Generative AI is AI that creates text, images or code. The chapter page does not name the survey behind the 88%, so this guide reports it as the AI Index's figure only.

The ONS explains the gap: "Lower estimates tend to capture direct, bottom-up use (for example, by workers or specific business functions). Higher estimates reflect a broader, top-down view of whether firms use any AI technology across their operations" [13]. Workers also report more use than firms. In ONS surveys of May and June 2026, 55% of employees in Great Britain said they use AI for work or education, while 35% of UK businesses with 10 or more employees reported using at least one AI technology [13].

Source	What it asks	Figure	Period
Census Bureau BTOS	Any AI use in the last two weeks, all businesses in the survey	24.6%	5 to 18 October 2026 [1]
Eurostat	At least one AI technology, enterprises with 10 or more employees	19.95%	2025 [10]
ONS BICS	At least one AI technology, businesses with 10 or more employees	38%	September 2026 [12]
Statistics Canada	AI to produce goods or deliver services, last 12 months	19.2%	Second quarter of 2026 [14]
Stanford AI Index	Organisational AI adoption, surveyed organisations	88%	2025 [15]

What a large company should do with these figures

Reveneau's view is that the official figures show how a company compares with others of its size and sector. To learn what its own staff do with AI, a company needs its own inventory of the AI it uses, by team and by tool, with a named owner for each. The page AI training for staff covers what staff need to know, and choosing your first AI use cases covers what to build first. A fund looking across several companies should read AI adoption in portfolio companies.

Reveneau is an AI software development consultancy with offices in San Francisco and Vancouver. Reveneau says AI writes all of its code and that every change must pass an eval suite written from the specification before release. To talk about a project, see Reveneau's services or contact Reveneau.