A sweeping review finds persistent gender gaps in generative AI adoption across countries, jobs, and tools.
The rapid spread of generative AI has created enormous expectations for productivity and growth. Yet new research points to a troubling pattern: women are less likely than men to adopt and intensively use these tools. In a new version of the HBS working paper “Global Evidence on Gender Gaps and Generative AI Over Time,” a team of co-authors including HBS AI Institute PI Rembrand Koning document that women continue to adopt and use generative AI at lower rates than men across countries, occupations, and tools. Drawing on a larger body of evidence than the 2024 version of their paper, the updated study shows that while the gender gap has narrowed as generative AI has diffused, it has not disappeared. This raises urgent questions about whether this technology will reduce inequality or quietly reinforce it.
Why This Matters
Generative AI is often described as a democratizing technology, but this research shows that access does not automatically produce equal use. If women are less likely to use AI tools, or use them less intensively, organizations may be leaving talent, efficiency, and innovation on the table. Business leaders and executives should be aware of the frictions that cause this inequality, and strive to create the conditions for equal participation: clear policies, hands-on training, encouragement, privacy safeguards, and workplace norms that reward thoughtful AI use rather than stigmatize it. Without that support, generative AI may reinforce existing inequalities instead of broadening opportunity.
Link to the HBS AI Institute Insight Article
Link to the Research Paper
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