Report: 83% of UK advertisers using AI
September 9, 2026



AI has moved firmly beyond experimentation in UK advertising, with more than eight in ten marketers (83 per cent) now actively using or piloting AI in production, according to research from XR. The findings suggest AI is becoming embedded across advertising and creative operations as brands and agencies respond to growing demand for content.

XR’s UK State of Ad Ops report found that 41 per cent of advertising professionals now use AI daily, and just 3 per cent have no plans to adopt it at all. Rather than replacing creative directors and teams though, AI is increasingly being used to help them produce more content, bring campaigns to market faster and support creative workflows at scale.


The research shows marketers’ priorities for AI are evolving. Speed to market (36 per cent) has overtaken cost savings as the top driver of adoption, closely followed by increasing the volume of creative assets produced (35 per cent). Reducing production costs ranks third (32 per cent), suggesting advertisers increasingly see AI as a way to keep pace with rising creative demand for cross-platform campaigns rather than simply reducing spend.

The study also highlights how AI is being adopted differently depending on where teams sit in the production process. Brand teams are using it earlier in the process, in pre-production and ideation, primarily to support image creation (50 per cent), copywriting (39 per cent) and campaign briefing (36 per cent). Full-service agencies have integrated AI more deeply across the full production workflow, with 43 per cent reporting daily use as standard practice.

“AI isn’t just a creative cost reduction tool for advertising agency and production teams, it’s how they are keeping up with the insatiable demand for more content,” commented Daniel Mark, President of Global Markets, XR Extreme Reach. ” The teams getting the most out of AI aren’t the ones automating fastest. They’re the ones who are weaving AI into the fabric of their whole production and delivery processes, so it becomes an essential ingredient to getting the work done faster and more efficiently.”

The findings also reveal subtle differences between the UK and US. While AI adoption is high in both markets, UK advertisers are focused on speed and output, primarily using AI to improve speed to market and increase creative volume. US respondents place greater emphasis on improving quality and personalisation. Together, the findings suggest AI is becoming core advertising infrastructure, with organisations shaping its use around their own operational priorities.