According to Gartner, customers favor ChatGPT over company chatbots.

      Businesses invested heavily in AI to address customer inquiries, but customers have different preferences. According to Gartner, Inc., individuals are about three times more inclined to utilize a third-party GenAI tool, like ChatGPT, rather than a company-specific chatbot for resolving service issues.

      Gartner, a research and advisory firm, conducted a survey with 3,566 customers in February and March. The use of external GenAI tools in service interactions has nearly doubled over the past year, while the usage of company chatbots has barely changed since 2022. In the United States, half of the population now engages with AI chatbots.

      Spending indicates a different narrative. Another Gartner survey involving 1,303 senior leaders revealed that customer service teams allocated a median of 12 percent of their 2025 budget to AI, the highest percentage among business functions. However, only 24 percent reported a positive financial return on this investment.

      Eric Keller, a senior director analyst at Gartner, noted, “The disappointing impact of customer-facing GenAI investments relates less to technology limitations and more to a misalignment with customer expectations.” He suggested that companies should develop AI-enhanced service journeys that integrate digital and voice interactions, rather than simply deploying standalone bots.

      Customer expectations have also evolved. People no longer just want an AI to provide answers; they expect it to perform tasks. Among GenAI users, 58 percent reported using it to take action on their behalf, with this figure increasing to 74 percent in business-to-business contexts.

      Customers now anticipate the bot to handle tasks such as booking appointments, submitting documents, or updating accounts, whereas most company chatbots primarily deliver answers. This disparity further explains why users are drawn to tools that can act on their behalf.

      The significance of these trends lies in the fact that customer service represents an initial assessment of the effectiveness of enterprise AI. Currently, the investment is growing faster than the returns, highlighting a widespread adoption versus impact gap across various industries. With AI development continuously focusing on similar tasks and competitors acquiring support-AI, companies that treat GenAI as merely an add-on chatbot risk losing customers to others' AI solutions.

      Additionally, it remains important to note that people still prefer speaking with a human when the bot is unable to resolve their issues.