Global consumer spending facilitated by agentic artificial intelligence (AI) is projected to more than triple to $3.35 trillion by 2030, accounting for 3.8% of total global consumer spending, according to a new report released by WARC in partnership with PHD.
The report, From Abundance to Agents – How the Delegation of Choice is Transforming Marketing, highlights how AI agents are rapidly evolving from recommendation tools into autonomous decision-making assistants that influence what consumers discover, compare and ultimately purchase.
Currently, AI-assisted consumer spending is estimated at $944 billion, representing 1.3% of global consumer expenditure. By the end of the decade, AI agents are expected to play a significantly larger role in mediating routine, complex and repetitive purchasing decisions across industries.
The study suggests that while consumers will continue to make the majority of purchasing decisions themselves over the next few years, AI agents will increasingly shape product discovery, shortlisting and purchasing decisions, fundamentally changing the customer journey and the marketing ecosystem.
“This research brings category level empiricism to the open-ended industry conversation about the growth opportunity with consumer facing AI and Agentic AI. It underscores the need for brands to design for both meaning and machine logic, and through Four Modes Framework offers marketers practical guidance on how best to implement against a category-level business case,” said Rohan Tambyrajah, Worldwide Chief Strategy Officer, PHD.
The report forecasts that the top ten global markets will account for nearly 68% of global agentic AI-enabled consumer spending by 2030.
The United States is expected to remain the largest market, contributing $1.1 trillion, or 31.9% of the global total, supported by widespread digital commerce adoption and significant investments by brands in AI capabilities.
China is projected to become the second-largest market with $505.8 billion in agentic AI spending, accounting for 15.1% of the global market, driven by integrated digital platforms, government support and consumer readiness for AI-powered commerce.
The United Kingdom is expected to contribute $131.2 billion, representing 3.9% of global AI-facilitated consumer spending, supported by strong AI talent, investment and government initiatives.
According to the report, telecoms and utilities, financial services, and travel and transport will experience the highest levels of autonomous AI transactions.
Telecoms and utilities are forecast to witness the fastest growth, with AI-facilitated consumer spending rising 611.9%, from $57.6 billion in 2026 to $410.3 billion by 2030, as AI agents increasingly manage contract comparisons, billing and service switching.
Financial services are expected to see AI-assisted spending reach $237.9 billion by 2030 despite the sector’s sensitivity and regulatory complexity, while travel and transport spending influenced by AI agents is projected to grow from $78.1 billion to $275.6 billion over the same period as AI automates trip discovery, planning and bookings.
The report also introduces PHD’s Four Modes Framework, which categorises how agentic AI will influence different industries based on purchasing behaviour and customer decision-making.
The framework identifies four interaction models—Agent to Agent, Agent to Consumer, Brand to Consumer, and Consumer to Consumer—highlighting that AI’s impact will vary significantly across sectors depending on factors such as purchase frequency, complexity and emotional involvement.
Consumer-facing sectors including food, soft drinks, media and publishing, retail, and alcoholic beverages are expected to witness substantial growth in AI-influenced spending due to their high purchase frequency and digitally measurable customer journeys.
In contrast, industries involving high-value or privacy-sensitive purchases, such as automobiles, electronics, and pharmaceuticals, are expected to continue relying heavily on direct brand trust and consumer decision-making rather than full AI delegation.
“This landmark study finds that agentic AI is already facilitating the path to purchase for many consumers, and will become deeply embedded over the coming years to influence $3.35trn in household expenditure by 2030.
“This is true not just in high-frequency categories such as travel, CPG, and utilities, but increasingly more so in sectors that have traditionally leveraged brand marketing as a core strategy. By mapping adoption across product sectors, markets and media, our research ensures practitioners are not caught flat-footed as they approach the new frontier,” said James McDonald, Director of Data, Intelligence & Forecasting, WARC, and author of the research.
The research is based on data provided by Acxiom and evaluates factors including decision complexity, purchase frequency, transaction value, data availability, media mix and regulatory environments across ten major markets—Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Mexico, South Korea, the UK and the US.
The report concludes that as AI agents become increasingly embedded in consumer purchasing journeys, brands will need to invest in structured, machine-readable data, build distinctive brand assets and develop unified brand narratives that resonate with both human consumers and AI-driven interfaces.
