Despite all the buzz, generative AI tools like ChatGPT are rarely used in everyday life, survey finds

Since the release of OpenAI's ChatGPT in November 2022, generative AI has become a hot topic in technology discussions, with its capabilities being widely covered.

But despite the hype surrounding new artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, Recent Research It turns out that very few people use AI tools like ChatGPT on a regular basis.

The survey, conducted by the Reuters Institute and Oxford University, involved more than 12,000 people in six countries, including France, Denmark and the UK, to gauge attitudes towards the use of GenAI models.

Survey results show that only a small percentage of people use ChatGPT daily, and even fewer use other generative AI tools such as Google Gemini or Microsoft Copilot.

Public awareness of AI tools

The majority of respondents said they have heard of several popular AI tools.

ChatGPT had the highest awareness, with 61% of Danish respondents and 58% of UK respondents saying they were aware of it.

However, similar tools like Google Gemini and Microsoft Copilot are less well known, with only around 15-25 percent of people aware of them.

The survey also found that more specialised AI tools such as Midjourney and Perplexity have less awareness among the general public.

Additionally, the percentage of people who were aware of homegrown AI products was not as high compared to internationally popular tools like ChatGPT.

For example, only 3% of French respondents said they were aware of Mistral, a France-based AI company.

Surveys show that while the majority of people have heard of widely touted AI tools, few report actually using them, and regular use remains rare.

How to use AI tools

ChatGPT is the most widely used AI tool among people surveyed across six countries, and is two to three times more popular than other large-scale language models (LLMs) such as Google's Gemini and Microsoft Copilot.

However, it is not used very often.

In France and the UK, only 2% of people said they use ChatGPT daily, and even fewer said they use other AI tools. In fact, no one in the UK said they use Google Gemini daily.

Most respondents who have tried generative AI tools said they have only used them once or twice since their launch.

Meanwhile, LLM usage is higher in the US, with 7% of people using ChatGPT daily and 11% using it weekly.

The survey revealed that the most notable differences in the use of AI tools vary by age group.

Younger people were more likely to adopt AI tools and use them more frequently.

Across the six countries surveyed, 56% of people aged 18-24 and 43% of people aged 25-34 reported having used generative AI at least once.

In contrast, only about 16% of people aged 55 and over used these tools.

Despite increased awareness and usage among younger people, overall usage remains low.

The majority of respondents said they use AI primarily in their personal lives, rather than for professional or academic purposes, although their specific uses for AI varied.

Across all countries surveyed, 24% of respondents used generative AI for information gathering, and 28% used it for media creation.

Among those who use it to get information, the most common uses are to answer factual questions (11%), seek advice (10%) and generate ideas (9%).

Other uses for retrieving information include text summarization, support services, translation, and access to the latest news.

Meanwhile, those who use generative AI for media creation are more likely to use it for tasks like writing emails or letters (9%), creating images (9%), producing videos (4%), and coding (5%).

Still, the majority of respondents working on media production with generative AI reported that they do so primarily for experimentation or play (11 percent).

The expected impact of generative AI

The majority of those surveyed said they expect generative AI to have a significant impact on nearly every sector of society within the next five years.

According to the report, an average of 72% of respondents expect generative AI to have a significant impact on search and social media companies.

Additionally, 66% expect it to have a major impact on the news media, and a similar proportion believe it will have a major impact on scientists' research.

Respondents also believe AI will have a major impact on a variety of industries, including healthcare and financial services (59% each), the military (56%) and government (53%).

Additionally, almost half of those surveyed believe these new technologies will have a significant impact on the general public.

On average, most respondents expect generative AI to improve their lives in some way, but slightly more expect it to have a negative impact on society overall.