A survey of 2,000+ US adults finds 57% know of ChatGPT, 46% for Bing Chat, 45% for My AI, and 38% for Bard; only ~33% have used the tools, with Gen Z dominating
We polled 2,000 people about how they're using AI, what they want it to do, and what scares them about it the most. Twitter: @teedubya and @rjcc Twitter: Lord Travis Wright / @teedubya : This is a beautiful article, amazing artwork @TheVerge Keep in mind this data is pulled from the BEGINNING of 2023, and the Ai world changed in March 2023. https://www.theverge.com/... Richard Lawler / @rjcc : The AI survey says.... https://twitter.com/... [image]
Context & Ripple Effects
This survey captures an early consumer-AI adoption gap: recognition of leading assistants had outpaced hands-on use, and Gen Z accounted for a disproportionate share of engagement. That makes it a useful baseline for the later rise in ChatGPT use among 18-to-29-year-olds reported in 2024.
Subsequent coverage suggests the category moved from novelty toward broader, though still uneven, use: a 2026 survey found nearly half of US adults reporting chatbot use. The intervening evidence also distinguishes information seeking from workplace use, rather than treating AI adoption as a single behavior.
First-order effects
- The survey gives ChatGPT, Bing Chat, My AI, and Bard a clear awareness-versus-usage benchmark: visibility alone had not converted most US adults into users.
- Gen Z's leading usage makes younger consumers the immediate test audience for product design, onboarding, and retention across these assistants.
Second-order effects
- Providers face pressure to turn name recognition into repeat use, favoring simpler access points and more concrete everyday use cases over stand-alone AI branding.
- The generational skew means competitors with existing consumer distribution can target younger users first, while workplace adoption remains a separate challenge; later reporting found AI used more often for information than for work.
Third-order effects
- If adoption continues to broaden as later surveys indicate, conversational AI is likely to become an everyday interface layer rather than a product used only by early adopters—an outcome that rewards distribution as much as model capability.
- Usage measures will need to separate occasional experimentation, daily reliance, information seeking, and work use; the later survey record shows these categories do not move in lockstep.
The trend: This is an early data point in the shift from high awareness of generative AI to uneven, demographic-led integration of chatbots into routine consumer tasks.