{"id":35497,"date":"2026-05-12T03:37:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T03:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/35497\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T03:37:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T03:37:12","slug":"korea-leads-surge-in-global-ai-adoption-as-asia-becomes-new-tech-engine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/35497\/","title":{"rendered":"Korea leads surge in global AI adoption as Asia becomes new tech engine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/7091ff64-536b-46d6-8705-33c71ad3604f.jpg\" style=\"height: auto; aspect-ratio: 1903 \/ 1136; width: 100%\" alt=\"Global generative artificial intelligence (AI) adoption rates by region in the first quarter of 2026 \/ Courtesy of Microsoft AI Economy Institute \" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"eager\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Global generative artificial intelligence (AI) adoption rates by region in the first quarter of 2026 \/ Courtesy of Microsoft AI Economy Institute <\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">Korea displayed the fastest growth in artificial intelligence (AI) adoption worldwide in the first quarter of 2026, according to a report released Tuesday by Microsoft, signaling a shift in the global tech landscape as Asian economies outpace the rest of the world.<\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">The report, \u201cGlobal AI Diffusion Q1 2026 Trends and Insights,\u201d found that Korea\u2019s usage rate jumped by 6.4 percentage points to 37.1 percent. The surge reflects a broader acceleration across Asia, which now claims 12 of the 15 fastest-growing AI markets globally, including significant gains in Thailand and Japan.<\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">Issued by Microsoft\u2019s AI Economy Institute, the findings attributed the regional momentum to aggressive government-led strategies, long-term investments in digital infrastructure and a high degree of consumer openness to new technologies. The development of more sophisticated Asian-language AI models has also lowered barriers to entry for millions of workers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">While Korea led in growth, the United Arab Emirates and Singapore remained the world leaders in total adoption, with usage rates of 70.1 percent and 63.4 percent, respectively. The U.S. rose to 21st place, with 31.3 percent of its working-age population utilizing generative tools.<\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">However, the report also highlighted a deepening &#8220;digital divide.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">Adoption in developed economies reached 27.5 percent, nearly double the 15.4 percent seen in developing nations, where limited electricity, inconsistent internet access and a lack of digital skills continue to hamper the integration of new software.<\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">&#8220;Asia has emerged as a new engine of global artificial intelligence adoption,&#8221; the report stated. Across the globe, the share of the working-age population using generative AI rose to 17.8 percent in the first quarter, up from 16.3 percent in the previous period.<\/p>\n<p class=\"editor-p\">This article was published with the assistance of generative AI and edited by The Korea Times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Global generative artificial intelligence (AI) adoption rates by region in the first quarter of 2026 \/ Courtesy of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[420,7829,320,7828],"class_list":{"0":"post-35497","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-microsoft","8":"tag-azure","9":"tag-azure-ai","10":"tag-microsoft","11":"tag-microsoft-ai"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}