Insurance executives plan to increase spending on artificial intelligence in 2026 despite facing critical skills shortages that threaten their ability to scale the technology, according to new research from Accenture.
The Pulse of Change survey, which polled 3,650 C-suite leaders across 20 industries and 20 countries between November and December 2025, found that 90% of insurance executives intend to invest more in AI this year. The research included responses from 218 senior insurance executives.
Most leaders view AI primarily as a revenue driver rather than a cost-cutting tool, with 85% seeing greater benefits for growth than for cost reduction.
However, the research identified a significant obstacle to realising AI’s potential value. A quarter of executives cited skilled talent shortages as the main factor limiting their ability to extract value from AI, matching concerns about poor integration between AI initiatives and core business strategy, at 24%.
Despite these challenges, only 24% of organisations have embedded continuous learning programmes related to AI, and fewer than one in 10 - just 5% - are redesigning job roles to support AI adoption.
The survey suggests AI is moving beyond the experimental phase, with 34% of insurance organisations now actively deploying AI agents across multiple functions. Almost one-third of insurance C-suite leaders use generative AI tools daily, while 57% use them at least once a week.
In addition, 29% of businesses are redesigning end-to-end processes with AI at the core.
Insurance executives expressed confidence even amid concerns about a potential AI bubble. If such a bubble were to burst, 47% said they would increase their AI investments and 37% said they would increase hiring.
“It’s clear that insurance leaders are confident in AI’s capacity to drive significant growth, and as such, they are decisively increasing investments, despite ROI uncertainty,” said Khalid Lahraoui, Accenture’s insurance industry group lead.
Two-thirds of executives are prioritising investments in AI and digital technologies to address accelerating change. While 67% said they feel prepared for technological disruption, they expressed less confidence about environmental disruption, at 39%, and geopolitical disruption, at 44%.
Despite 84% expecting more change in 2026 than in 2025, optimism remains high, with 78% anticipating faster revenue growth and 82% planning to hire more people.
