According to the "2026 AI Status Report" released by market research firm Sensor Tower, although ChatGPT remains the most popular AI assistant globally, its market share has fallen below 50% for the first time. Data shows that before January this year, ChatGPT's global market share remained above 50%; by the end of May, this proportion had dropped to 46.4%.

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Meanwhile, competitors are continuously expanding their influence. Google Gemini's market share rose to 27.7%, and Claude reached 10.3%. In addition, the market shares of products such as Grok, Perplexity, DeepSeek, and Meta AI are all below 5%. The report indicates that more users are starting to switch between multiple AI assistants based on different scenarios, driving changes in the competitive landscape.

The overall market continues to expand rapidly. Sensor Tower expects that the number of global AI app downloads in the first half of 2026 will approach 2.3 billion, with user spending exceeding $4.2 billion, a significant increase from $1.83 billion in the first half of 2025. During the same period, the total usage time of AI apps is expected to increase from 17.2 billion hours in the first half of 2025 to about 36 billion hours, more than doubling.

Looking at user usage, the three major AI assistants, ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude, account for 89% of the total usage time of AI assistant apps, indicating that leading products have formed a clear advantage. In contrast, adjacent fields such as AI companions and AI content generation remain highly fragmented, with an unstable competitive landscape.

As AI assistants gradually become important entry points for users to access information, create content, and enhance productivity, industry competition is shifting from a single product capability contest to a comprehensive competition involving ecosystem coverage, model capabilities, and user retention. The competition for market share among leading manufacturers is also expected to intensify further.