# AI automation by industry Updated October 2026 AI can take on the most work at finance and insurance, about 977 hours a year per person, and the least in hospitality and food service, at 457 hours. The difference comes from how much of each industry's work is office work. ## Industries by AI opportunity Ranked by the share of a working year AI can take on per person. [See the same ranking for teams](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/). 1. [Finance and insurance, 977 hours a year per person, exposure 58 of 100, share of a working year **49%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/finance-and-insurance/) 2. [Accounting, consulting and advertising, 919 hours a year per person, exposure 56 of 100, share of a working year **46%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/professional-services/) 3. [Software and IT services, 918 hours a year per person, exposure 58 of 100, share of a working year **46%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/software-companies/) 4. [Legal services, 898 hours a year per person, exposure 53 of 100, share of a working year **45%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/law-firms/) 5. [Media and publishing, 811 hours a year per person, exposure 51 of 100, share of a working year **41%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/media/) 6. [Telecommunications, 784 hours a year per person, exposure 49 of 100, share of a working year **39%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/telecoms/) 7. [Real estate, 744 hours a year per person, exposure 44 of 100, share of a working year **37%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/real-estate/) 8. [Government, 690 hours a year per person, exposure 41 of 100, share of a working year **35%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/government/) 9. [Education, 681 hours a year per person, exposure 43 of 100, share of a working year **34%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/education/) 10. [Healthcare, 657 hours a year per person, exposure 38 of 100, share of a working year **33%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/healthcare/) 11. [Retail, 655 hours a year per person, exposure 41 of 100, share of a working year **33%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/retail/) 12. [Manufacturing, 621 hours a year per person, exposure 35 of 100, share of a working year **31%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/manufacturing/) 13. [Gambling and gaming, 555 hours a year per person, exposure 34 of 100, share of a working year **28%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/gaming-and-gambling/) 14. [Transportation and warehousing, 551 hours a year per person, exposure 31 of 100, share of a working year **28%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/logistics/) 15. [Hospitality and food service, 457 hours a year per person, exposure 28 of 100, share of a working year **23%**](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-for/industries/hospitality/) ## Next steps ### Find the tasks to automate first in your business We map the tasks in your teams, score each one the way these pages do and build the automations that pay back first. [Book an AI audit](https://www.aigentcy.com/audit/) Occupation data from the O\*NET 30.3 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA), used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and modified by Aigentcy. O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. Wage, employment and projection data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. EU occupation names from ESCO, European Commission. AI usage signals from the Anthropic Economic Index (CC BY) and Microsoft Research (CC BY 4.0). [Methodology and sources](https://www.aigentcy.com/ai-exposure/methodology/). Scores © Aigentcy. Quote them with a link to the page.