KPMG Global tech report 2026

The pace of tech change isn’t slowing — it’s exploding.
AI, quantum and next‑gen technologies are reshaping how UK organisations operate, compete and grow. Leaders now face a simple question: Are you ready to lead in the Intelligence Age?

Download the KPMG Global Tech Report 2026 to see how UK tech leaders are scaling AI, managing risk and unlocking ROI and how this compares globally.

UK snapshot – What’s different here?

UK executives are more concerned about cyber attacks (43%) than the global average and transparency is an even bigger concern (44%).
UK organisations aim to scale AI faster, with 76% expecting to deploy enterprise-wide AI use cases within 12 months.
Revenue expectations from AI are higher in the UK (91%) compared with the global view.
UK leaders show slightly lower centralisation of AI implementation vs global (IT leads AI in 67% of UK orgs vs 73% globally).

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Key highlights and findings

Meeting the challenge of the Intelligence Age

In an era characterised by the immense growth of tech, most organisations have bold plans to uplift maturity in 2026, fueling the shift from experimentation to scale. However, intensifying challenges of tech debt, cost pressures and talent shortages are holding many back from realising their tech goals.

Building adaptive strategies amid continual disruption

With the fast pace of innovation, tech plans are often obsolete before implementation. To thrive amid this constant change, technology leaders must coordinate investment priorities across the enterprise, build clarity around strategic decision making, create a culture that can leverage the best of tech, and ensure the foundations of data and resilience are spot on.

Realising value from tech investment

ROI on tech investment can vary dramatically based on factors such as readiness, diligent governance, execution discipline, and organisational agility. Investment decision making, particularly for new AI tools, has often been based on indirect and hypothetical benefits, adding to the complexity of getting it right. Tech executives need to look at the typical pattern of ROI for guidance and update their ROI KPIs to align with the kinds of business value that AI can generate.

The foundations for the next wave

The rise of agentic AI is commanding the attention of tech executives, but there are even more disruptive AI tech trends on the horizon.

Quantum provides immense computing power and calls for superior security, while Artificial General Intelligence and Artificial Superintelligence hold unpredictable potential. One eye must always remain fixed on what is coming next.

* High performers are organisations distinguished by advanced tech maturity, process maturity, and the ability to consistently deliver significant value from their digital investments.

What this means for UK organisations

UK organisations are moving from exploration to execution but unevenly.

Talent shortages, inconsistent governance and legacy tech debt remain key barriers. Yet the UK stand out in:

embracing AI as a revenue driver

accelerated plans for AI-at-scale

a sharper focus on cyber security and trust frameworks

The KPMG data shows tech executives expect a sharp move from pilots to ROI in the next year: 88 percent of organisations are already embedding AI agents into their workflows, products and value streams. High performers expect about half of their tech teams to be permanent human staff by 2027. This signals a future where small, durable human cores orchestrate large AI-augmented ecosystems.

Zack Kass,

Global AI advisor, thought leader, and former Head of Go-to-Market, OpenAI

Your 2026 agenda

UK leaders should prioritise building AI fluency and contextual training, not just providing tools. UK employees report feeling “left behind” by the pace of change, showing the importance of skills pathways.

Cybersecurity should remain a non‑negotiable foundation, as UK concern levels exceed global averages.

And with the UK anticipating one of the fastest shifts to AI‑driven revenue growth, now is the time to redesign work, not just automate tasks.

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Leading in the Intelligence Age: Excelling today, shaping tomorrow

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AI has matured. It’s now tangible, understandable, and implementable at speed. But the real story is business transformation. Organisations are moving away from simply automating old processes toward fundamentally redesigning how work gets done. It’s not just a tech shift—it’s an organisational design shift. And that’s where AI will have its biggest impact over the next few years

Leanne Allen

Head of AI, KPMG in the UK

About the research

The KPMG Global tech report 2026 is based on a survey of 2,500 tech executives from 27 countries, including 43 percent from Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA); 29 percent from Asia-Pacific (ASPAC); and 28 percent from the Americas.

The tech executives are representatives from eight industries: automotive, consumer and retail, energy, financial services, government, healthcare and life sciences, industrial manufacturing, and tech and telecom. A significant proportion of the tech executives surveyed are senior leaders, and annual revenues for all organisations in our survey are above US$100 million.

This report features valuable insights on emerging technology trends from interviews with eight global technology leaders including Dean Bortz, Director, AI Go-to-Market, Google; Zack Kass, Global AI advisor, thought leader, and former Head of Go-to-Market, OpenAI; Noelle Russell, AI Solutions Architect and Strategic Advisor, CEO, AI Leadership Institute; and Seth Patton, General Manager, Product Marketing, Microsoft 365 Copilot.