India to lead multimodal AI use, daily usage seen doubling to 43 pc by 2030: Report

New Delhi: India is poised to lead the surge in multimodal artificial intelligence (AI) adoption with daily use across text, voice, images and video projected to nearly double to 43 per cent by 2030, a report said on Monday.

According to Ericsson ConsumerLab research, AI usage in the country is pegged to surge by 95.45 per cent from 22 per cent at present, outpacing the global average of 30 per cent.

It further points to a shift from occasional AI interactions towards more frequent use across different devices and locations, creating new demands on mobile networks.

As consumers increasingly use AI while on the move and share more images, video and voice with AI services, network traffic is expected to become more upload-heavy and unevenly distributed.

"AI is becoming an integral part of how consumers search, create and communicate today. As AI becomes more multimodal and mobile, consumers will expect these experiences to work reliably across devices and wherever they are," said Nitin Bansal, Managing Director, Ericsson India.

"India's strong digital foundation provides an opportunity to support this next phase of AI adoption. High-performing networks will be important to delivering the responsiveness, capacity and reliability that emerging AI experiences will require," he added.

Globally, AI super users represent around 10 per cent of all consumers today and are expected to account for 30 per cent by 2030, while generating more than 80 per cent of all AI activity.

For AI super users, response time has 2.5 times the influence on network satisfaction compared with average users, the report said.

The research also highlighted the growth of agentic AI with 38 per cent of smartphone users expecting to use agentic AI by 2030, compared with 4 per cent as of now.

However, consumers expect these services to save around one hour of screen time each day.

Apart from that, trust will also be important with more than half of daily AI users strongly concerned about fake or hacked AI assistants.

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