On September 16, 2026 the venture firm Menlo Ventures published its second annual consumer AI report, built on a Morning Consult survey of 5,067 US adults fielded in July 2026. It is the first large public survey we have seen that asks what people let AI agents touch. Of AI users, 41% have tried an agent and 24% use one regularly. In the report's agent section, 36% have given an agent access to their email and 20% to a financial account.
This page is a reference. It tables more than 40 figures from the report, "2026: The State of Consumer AI" by Shawn Carolan, Amy Wu Martin and Sam Borja, and states the base for each one. The bases matter. A share of agent users is a share of about four in ten AI users, who are themselves 64% of adults. Quote a figure with its base or do not quote it.
- 01Adoption barely moved; depth did.Use among US adults rose from 61% to 64%. Daily use rose from 19% to 25%, and 55% of AI users now pay for at least one product.
- 02A third of AI users have skipped the final check.32% of AI users have let AI act on their behalf at least once without a final sign-off. The report counts purchases, email workflows and agent use.
- 03Email is the most-granted permission.Email 36%, web browser 33%, messaging 31%, cloud storage 29%, calendar 27%, health apps 23%, financial accounts 20%.
- 04Trust now outranks ease of use.AI users rank accuracy (45%), trustworthiness (40%) and security and privacy (36%) above ease of use, which fell from 38% to 32%.
01 — The datasetAdoption and daily use
Three groups appear throughout. "US adults" is the full weighted sample. "AI users" are respondents classed as users from the tools they reported using in the past six months. "Payers" are AI users who pay for at least one AI product. The 2025 column comes from the firm's earlier wave of 5,031 adults in April 2025, and is filled only where the report prints a comparison.
| Measure | Base | 2026 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Use AI | US adults | 64% | 61% |
| Use AI every day | US adults | 25% | 19% |
| Use AI every day | AI users | 39% | 31% |
| Use a general AI assistant every day | US adults | 22% | – |
| Spend more than an hour a day with AI | AI users | 24% | – |
| Spend less than 15 minutes a day with AI | AI users | 29% | – |
| Use AI more than a year ago | AI users | 52% | – |
| Use AI, household income $100,000 or more | That income group | 77% | – |
| Use AI, household income under $50,000 | That income group | 56% | – |
| Have not used AI in the past six months | US adults | 36% | 39% |
The report's footnote gives the adoption figures to one decimal: 61.0% to 63.6%. It also notes that some of the 36% classed as non-users may be meeting AI inside search or email without recognising it. For wider usage data from other sources, see our AI usage statistics reference.
02 — AgentsAgents and autonomy
The report defines an agent as AI that can reason, make decisions, complete multi-step tasks and take actions in other systems. The agent, spending and sentiment questions are new in 2026, so none has a 2025 baseline. Two footnotes change how to read this table. The 72% awareness figure includes respondents who said they were unsure. The 32% no-sign-off figure includes people who used AI to complete a shopping purchase or an email workflow, as well as those who use agents.
| Measure | Base | 2026 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aware of AI agents | AI users | 72% | – |
| Have tried an agent | AI users | 41% | – |
| Use an agent regularly | AI users | 24% | – |
| Have let AI act without a final sign-off, at least once | AI users | 32% | – |
| Pay for at least one AI product | Agent users | 92% | – |
| Use AI every day | Agent users | 63% | – |
| Use an agent | AI payers | 65% | – |
| Use an agent | Non-payers | 13% | – |
| Pay $100 or more a month | Paying regular agent users | 21% | – |
| Pay $100 or more a month | Paying non-agent users | 5% | – |
| Use Codex | Agent users | 35% | – |
| Use Claude Code or Cowork | Agent users | 32% | – |
| Use Perplexity | Agent users | 24% | – |
| Let AI complete a purchase | Shoppers who use AI | 26% | – |
| Made a final purchase decision on AI's recommendation | Shoppers who use AI | 37% | – |
The product rows are shares of agent users and respondents could name more than one. The report adds that three newer agents each reach between 10% and 16%. Agent users are a heavy-use group: 92% pay for AI against 55% of AI users overall, and 63% use AI daily against 39%.
03 — PermissionsWhat agents can reach
These seven figures are the reason this page exists. One caution on the base: the report presents them in its section on agent users and words them as access that "consumers have given agents". The text does not restate the denominator, and the report says its chart titles carry the base. We show them as presented and recommend citing them as shares of agent users only after checking the chart.
Access granted to AI agents, by account type
Menlo Ventures, 2026: The State of Consumer AI; Morning Consult survey, July 2026. Presented in the report's agent-user section.The order is worth noticing. Email, the browser and messaging are the accounts through which most other accounts can be reset or reached, and they are granted most often. Health and financial accounts, which people think of as sensitive, come last. The gap between first and last is 16 points. People appear to rate the sensitivity of an account by its contents, not by what it can unlock.
04 — Money and trustPayment and trust
Who pays is a "select all" question, so those three rows sum to more than 100%. The report's text says 48% of payers cover costs "entirely themselves" while its footnote says 48% pay for at least one tool themselves. We use the footnote wording. The report also gives the typical payer's spend as $20 to $49 a month.
| Measure | Base | 2026 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pay for at least one AI product | AI users | 55% | – |
| Spend more on AI than a year ago | Payers | 46% | – |
| Spend less on AI than a year ago | Payers | 12% | – |
| Spend $100 or more a month (60% of all spend) | Payers | 14% | – |
| Pay for at least one tool themselves | Payers, select all | 48% | – |
| A family member or friend pays | Payers, select all | 34% | – |
| An employer or school pays | Payers, select all | about 20% | – |
| Rank accuracy as a selection factor | AI users | 45% | – |
| Rank trustworthiness as a selection factor | AI users | 40% | – |
| Rank security and privacy as a selection factor | AI users | 36% | – |
| Rank ease of use as a selection factor | AI users | 32% | 38% |
| Less likely to engage with content known to be AI-generated | US adults | 36% | – |
| More interested in content known to be AI-generated | US adults | 14% | – |
| Distrust AI-generated information | Non-users | 70% | 58% |
| Have privacy concerns | Non-users | 76% | – |
| Would rather deal with a person | Non-users | 83% | – |
| Prefer a human for a medical diagnosis (19% prefer AI) | All respondents | 63% | – |
| Prefer a human for legal advice (21% prefer AI) | All respondents | 59% | – |
| Say AI has improved their life (10% say worse) | All respondents | 38% | – |
The report's $40 billion global consumer spend figure, its two billion global users and its five predictions for 2027 are the firm's estimates and forecasts, not survey results. They are not in these tables. If you cite them, label them as Menlo Ventures estimates.
05 — ReadingWhat a product should ask for
Two figures together set the design problem. A third of AI users have already let AI finish something without a final check, and the accounts granted most often are the ones with the widest reach. At the same time, security and privacy now rank above ease of use when people choose a product. Users will grant access, and they are watching what you do with it.
Our reading for anyone building a consumer-facing agent:
- Ask first for what the first task needs. A calendar agent asks for the calendar. Email and browser access come when a task requires them, with the reason shown.
- Never ask for financial or health access at install. Only 20% report granting a financial account. A request at the door reads as overreach.
- Make approval the default for actions that leave the account. Sending, paying, deleting and publishing get a confirmation until the user turns it off for that action type.
- Show what was done. An activity log is the answer to the accuracy and trust rankings above.
For how coding agents handle the same question, see our census of coding-agent permission defaults and the comparison of default-deny and default-allow permission models. We design permission flows for client agents through our AI transformation practice.
06 — MethodMethodology
Every figure on this page comes from one published report. We collected nothing ourselves and we did not see the survey instrument or the raw data.
- Who ran it
- Menlo Ventures commissioned the survey and Morning Consult fielded it. Menlo Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in AI companies, including some named in its report.
- Sample and dates
- 5,067 US adults, July 2026. Comparisons use the firm's 2025 wave of 5,031 US adults from April 2025. The report says 37 of this year's 41 activities were asked identically in 2025.
- Weighting
- The report describes the sample as nationally representative, with weights for education, gender, age, race and ethnicity, and region.
- Base per section
- Adoption rows are US adults unless marked. Agent awareness, trial and no-sign-off rows are AI users. Payment rows are payers. The seven access figures are shown as the report presents them, in its agent-user section, without a restated base.
- As-of date
- The report was read on September 17, 2026. This page is dated to the report's publication day; the collection date is stated here and not elsewhere.
- Known limitations
- One survey, one country, self-reported behaviour, commissioned by an investor in the sector. Respondents may not recognise AI inside other products, and may not agree on what counts as an agent. The 2025 wave ran in spring and the 2026 wave in July, which the report says dampens growth on school and work activities.
07 — Next stepPeople grant the widest keys first
List every permission your agent requests and when it asks
Write down each permission your product asks for, the screen where it asks, and the first task that needs it. Move anything not needed for the first task out of onboarding. Then check which actions run without confirmation today. The survey says a third of AI users have accepted that. It also says they now choose products on trust before convenience, so the log and the confirmation are features.