The BTOS questionnaire defines AI as computer systems and software able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence, such as decision-making, visual perception, speech recognition and language processing.

Examples of AI technologies and applications include machine learning, natural language processing, virtual agents, predictive analytics, machine vision, voice recognition, decision-making systems, data analytics, text analytics and image processing.

While it may seem like AI is everywhere, BTOS shows the opposite. Based on survey responses, only an estimated 3.9% of businesses used AI to produce goods or services between Oct. 23 and Nov. 5, 2023. However, this usage varied widely among economic sectors (Figure 1).

Businesses in the Information sector reported greater levels of AI use than the national average: 13.8% of businesses indicated that they were currently using the technology.

The Information sector includes industries like software producers, computing infrastructure providers, data processing, web hosting and related services, which rely on various applications of artificial intelligence.

Businesses in the Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sector also reported a large share (9.1%) of AI adopters compared to overall totals.

These high rates are not surprising as these sectors include industries (publishing, data processing and hosting, financial investment, motion pictures and sound recording) that typically rely heavily on data analysis, automated decision making, and word, image and sound processing.