Press Release AI Platforms Study 2026

As AI Use Grows, Americans Worry About Losing Human Interaction, ACSI Data Show

With satisfaction scores on par with social media, AI platforms face a trust and adoption gap that capabilities alone cannot close

ANN ARBOR, Mich. (April 16, 2026) — Americans have mixed reviews on artificial intelligence (AI), and many are still figuring out where they stand.

Across six measured platforms — Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, Claude, ChatGPT, Grok, and Perplexity — overall customer satisfaction is an ACSI score of 73 (on a scale of 0 to 100), according to a new survey of 2,711 U.S. adults from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI®). That score places AI alongside energy utilities and below airlines, social media, and mortgage lenders — industries not typically recognized for exceptional customer experiences.

Google Gemini leads all platforms at 76, followed by Microsoft Copilot (74), Claude and ChatGPT (73 apiece), and Grok and Perplexity (both at 71).

More than half of U.S. adults (56%) have no recent experience using any AI platform. Among the 44% who do, engagement is intense — 52% use AI at least once a day, and 25% use it every few days.

What worries people most

Twenty-one percent report an “extremely favorable” outlook toward AI, while an equal 21% say they are “very concerned about the consequences.” The majority (58%) fall somewhere in between, forming a large group that is still shaping its opinion.

The survey shows that adoption functions less like a gradual ramp and more like a threshold. Consumers who clear it tend to make AI a daily habit. Those who have not are held back by two factors the ACSI data identify as the strongest drivers of satisfaction: functional reliability and trust around data security.

Forty-three percent of respondents cite reduced human-to-human interaction as their top worry — ahead of job loss for future generations (37%) and their own job risk (31%). For AI platforms and companies deploying AI in customer-facing contexts, that finding points to a tension that capability improvements alone will not resolve. The very efficiency that makes AI useful is what makes a significant share of consumers uneasy about it.

“Consumers spent the last decade learning to distrust how social media platforms handle their data, and AI’s privacy scores suggest they’re carrying that skepticism forward,” said Forrest Morgeson, Associate Professor of Marketing at Michigan State University and Director of Research Emeritus at the ACSI. “Social media never fully lost its users over privacy, but it never fully earned their trust either. AI platforms are at that same inflection point, except the stakes are higher because people are sharing prompts about their jobs, their health, their finances. The window to get ahead of that trust deficit is right now.”

Generational differences shape both who uses AI and what they use it for

Baby Boomers are the most cautious adopters — 35% say they are very concerned about AI’s consequences, compared to just 6% who view it extremely favorably. When Boomers do use AI, the use cases skew utilitarian. Research and information gathering leads at 68%, the highest rate of any generation for that category, and shopping and product comparisons (29%) rank well above younger users. Longer writing (8%) and data analysis register far lower, a pattern consistent with treating AI as a high-powered search engine rather than a work tool.

Gen Z takes a wider approach. They use AI for drafting emails (35%), writing longer pieces (39%), data analysis (27%), and games and entertainment (24%). Despite that engagement, Gen Z posts the lowest satisfaction score of any generation at 69, against 74 for Millennials, Gen X, and Baby Boomers alike, with loyalty trailing by a similar margin. They are pushing AI furthest into creative and analytical territory where performance is still uneven, and their expectations there are not being met.

Millennials and Gen X, grouped together in the study, are the closest thing to a power-user baseline, leading or matching other generations across research (57%), longer writing (39%), email drafting (34%), and advice or recommendations (48%), with the highest optimism around efficiency gains from AI. High income earners show the greatest adoption overall — 72% of respondents earning $100,000 or more have used AI recently, and 39% hold extremely favorable views. Even so, concerns persist within this group around job loss, accuracy, and reduced human interaction.

Additional key findings:

• The industries where Americans see the most value from AI are also where concerns are highest, including technology (50% value, 27% concern), healthcare (34%, 29%), and finance (26%, 27%).
• Paying users report meaningfully higher satisfaction and loyalty. Among premium subscribers, ChatGPT jumps to a score of 80 and Google Gemini reaches 82.
• Improved access to information (39%) is the most commonly cited benefit of AI, followed by time savings (29%) and improved work efficiency (29%). More accessible education (10%) and enhanced health care (17%) trail but represent meaningful long-term expectations.
• AI use skews personal: 29% of active users say they use AI exclusively for personal purposes, 8% exclusively for work, and the majority use it for both.

Download the full report and follow the ACSI on LinkedIn and X at @theACSI.

No advertising or other promotional use can be made of the data and information in this release without the express prior written consent of ACSI LLC.

About the ACSI

The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI®) is a national economic indicator and a leading provider of customer analytics products that help organizations build lasting customer relationships and prove ROI on experience investments. ACSI’s AI-enhanced platform delivers intuitive dashboards and cause-and-effect analytics that pinpoint the quality drivers most predictive of customer allegiance, retention, price tolerance, and financial performance. ACSI data has been shown to correlate strongly with key micro and macroeconomic indicators, including consumer spending, GDP growth, earnings, and stock returns.

Founded in 1994 at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, the ACSI measures customer satisfaction with more than 400 companies in over 40 industries, including federal government services, based on approximately 200,000 annual interviews. Learn more at https://www.theacsi.org.

ACSI and its logo are Registered Marks of American Customer Satisfaction Index LLC.