Consumer-facing industries - retail, travel, hospitality, and financial services - are the fastest adopters of AI agents

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ZDNET's key takeaways

• Leading companies increased AI agent adoption by 119% in the first half of 2025.
• Employee interactions with AI agents grew at an average monthly rate of 65%.
• Retail saw AI and agent actions grow at a monthly average rate of 128%.

AI agent creation among first-mover companies surged 119% between January and June of 2025, with service organizations leading the adoption of agents, with the average number of customer service conversations led by an agent growing 22 times in the first half of 2025, according to Salesforce's Agentic Enterprise Index. 

Salesforce analyzed and aggregated usage data using its own AI products to uncover the story of agents in the workforce. Looking at trends over the past six months, the Salesforce Agentic Enterprise Index analyzes the activity and engagement of businesses ...