🕵️‍♂️ Inside the 0.04% Club

Everyone’s using AI these days… aren’t they?

The actual numbers tell a story that’s way more layered than that.

And those layers matter if you’re running a business or leading a team.

Almost a year ago I recorded a Reel in my car at the gym (link)

The first words out of my mouth?

“We’re so early”

Today, almost a full year later, we’re still early.

🤖 Most People Still Haven’t Used AI

The number of people using AI right now is a lot less than you think and early adopters are benefiting the most from this unique time in history.

Key Facts

• ⬜️ 84% of humanity - about 6.8 billion people - have never opened ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, or anything similar.
• 🟩 16% (≈1.3 billion) tried a free chatbot once or twice.
• 🟨 0.3% (≈15–25 million) pay for plans such as ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro, or GitHub Copilot.
• 🟥 0.04% of all humans - are using AI to build on.

☝️ The Chart That Made Me Stop Scrolling

There’s a visualization that went semi-viral recently.

Each square is colored based on the most advanced way someone interacts with AI.

The claim it made was bold: roughly 84% of humans have never intentionally used AI.

And only a tiny sliver pays for tools or uses serious coding and agent workflows.

I get why it resonated.

Because in tech circles, AI feels like oxygen.

But step outside those circles, and you still meet plenty of sharp, capable people who haven’t opened a chatbot even once.

Newer adoption numbers paint a different picture.

Over 1 billion people now use standalone GenAI tools every month.

That includes ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, and others.

Depending on the dataset and how you define “active,” that puts usage at roughly 12-16% of everyone on Earth.

Picture a stadium with 50,000 seats.

Paid users of ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro or Copilot would fill fewer than 15 seats.

Engineers running true agent workflows would take up only two.

On the business side, estimates show 78-89% of companies use AI in at least one function, and around 71% report GenAI use in some form.

And then there’s the agent layer.

In real telemetry data from Anthropic, roughly 49% of agent tool calls are code-related.

Most “real” agent use is still guarded by approvals and permissions.

So we’ve got broad adoption at the surface. And a very concentrated group doing the serious building underneath.

That gap between the two is where a lot of business advantage is going to come from in 2026.

🏁 Why Software Is “Agent Country” Right Now

A lot of people chalk this up to developers loving new tools.

But the bigger reason is structural.

Software is an environment where agents can succeed because the work is already set up in a way that makes AI safer.

Here’s what software has that many other departments still lack.

• Everything important is already text and organized.
• Feedback is fast and blunt.
• Mistakes are usually reversible.
• Clear boundaries are easy to set.

Teams aren’t saying, “Cool, AI, go run the company.”

They start with tight permissions. They add approvals. They keep runs short. They watch what happens.

And then, over time, they increase autonomy in places where errors are cheap and visible.

💡 If You’re Not in Software, This Still Applies to You

If you work in finance, sales, ops, HR, healthcare, legal, logistics, education, or marketing, this pattern matters for you too.

The lesson from the software world is straightforward: agents thrive in environments that are structured, logged, permissioned, and reversible.

So the practical question for your business becomes: where could you make work more versioned, more testable, and easier to roll back?

Yes, AI is spreading. Fast.

But the people and teams who move from casual prompts to consistent workflows to tool-using agents are still early.

And that early window is where a lot of leverage sits for businesses willing to put in the work now.

👀 Ladies In San Diego - I’m Speaking In Your Town This Month

Excited to share that I’ll be speaking at Energetics of Business Live in San Diego March 19th at the VIP day for this event.

Interested in joining me? Here’s the link

Use code BEMYGUEST to save 30% off tickets.

🧩 Try This, This Week (10 Minutes)

Pick one recurring task and answer these three prompts. Write them down somewhere your team can see:

• What does “good output” look like?
• What’s the review step?
• What’s the rollback?

Three questions.

Ten minutes.

And suddenly, you have a framework your whole team can use.

P.S. I’ve got one VIP day spot for March left, and I’m reviewing applications.