The United Arab Emirates has become the first economy in Microsoft’s AI adoption index to pass the 70% mark, underlining how far ahead some digitally advanced markets have moved as global AI usage continues to rise unevenly.
Microsoft’s Global AI Diffusion Report for Q1 2026 placed AI usage in the UAE at 70.1% of the working-age population. That compares with a global average of 17.8%, after worldwide adoption rose from 16.3% during the quarter.
The findings give the UAE a clear headline position in Microsoft’s National AI Leaderboard, but they also point to a wider divide. AI adoption now stands at 27.5% in the Global North, compared with 15.4% in the Global South, according to Microsoft.
The UAE crosses a new threshold
The UAE is the first economy in Microsoft’s index to record AI usage above 70%, after adoption rose from 59.4% to 64% and then to 70.1% in the latest quarterly findings.
The index measures usage rather than ambition or investment. Microsoft looks at the share of people aged 15 to 64 who used a generative AI product during the quarter, drawing on aggregated and anonymised usage data adjusted for internet access, population size and device market share.
On that basis, the UAE’s position reflects more than policy signalling. The country has made AI a national priority, with investment across digital infrastructure, public-sector adoption and skills programmes.
Amr Kamel, general manager, Microsoft UAE, said: “Growth at this scale reflects deliberate, long-term investment in the right foundations, even through more challenging periods. This milestone belongs to the UAE, to its government, its institutions, its businesses, and the people who have made AI part of how they work and learn. The priority now is what comes next: enabling organisations to operate with confidence, sustain continuity, and build forward responsibly. Microsoft’s role is to support that journey as a long-term partner to the UAE.”
Microsoft’s UAE footprint includes cloud regions in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, alongside a sovereign cloud collaboration with G42 and Core42 for public sector and regulated industries requiring in-country data governance.
The adoption figures come as Microsoft continues a wider $15.2 billion investment programme in the UAE, covering AI infrastructure, skills and innovation, including a target to train one million learners in AI by 2027.
A wider gap in global adoption
The UAE’s position contrasts with the global average. While 26 economies now have AI usage rates above 30% of the working-age population, Microsoft’s data shows that adoption remains much lower across many lower-income markets.
Microsoft links the uneven spread of AI to connectivity, digital infrastructure, skills and local-language capability. Adoption is moving fastest in markets where those foundations already exist, while countries still building them face a slower path to everyday use.
Asia recorded some of the strongest growth in the first quarter. South Korea, Thailand and Japan saw notable movement, helped in part by improvements in AI performance across Asian languages.
Access to AI does not only depend on whether tools exist, it also depends on whether they work well in the languages people use at work, in education and in public services.
The US also moved up Microsoft’s national rankings, rising from 24th to 21st with AI usage at 31.3% of the working-age population.
Coding shows where usage is changing work
Microsoft’s report also highlights software development as one of the clearest areas where generative AI is already changing output.
Microsoft said Git pushes, where developers put coding changes online, increased 78% year on year globally. The rise reflects increased production through tools including Anthropic’s Claude Code, OpenAI’s Codex and Microsoft’s GitHub Copilot.
The labour market picture remains more complicated. Microsoft said the available data does not yet show AI coding tools reducing demand for software developers. In the US, software developer employment reached approximately 2.2 million in 2025, up 8.5% year on year, while employment in March 2026 was around 4% higher than in March 2025.
The company argues that if AI lowers the cost of building software, organisations may respond by building more of it. That would make AI-assisted coding less a simple replacement story and more a question of how much new demand the technology creates.
For the UAE, the latest figures reinforce its position as one of the world’s leading AI adoption markets. For the wider global economy, the report raises the question: whether AI adoption will spread broadly, or whether countries with stronger digital infrastructure, skills programmes and policy support will pull further ahead.