Despite roughly half of U.S. adults now using AI chatbots, only 8% say they are turning to tools like ChatGPT, Copilot and Gemini for information about the 2026 midterm elections, according to a Pew Research Center survey published Thursday.

The findings, based on a survey of 5,273 U.S. adults conducted from October 12 to 18, 2026, suggest that chatbots have become a routine utility for work and everyday questions but remain a marginal channel for election information — at least so far, with Election Day less than three weeks away. For more context on this story, see our ongoing latest AI developments.

What the Small Share of Users Actually Ask

For the Americans who do consult chatbots about the election, the questions cluster around candidates rather than logistics. Among those using AI chatbots for election information, Pew found that:

  • 76% have asked where the candidates stand on the issues
  • 71% have used chatbots to check the accuracy of things they heard or read elsewhere about the candidates or issues
  • 65% have asked about the candidates' lives and careers
  • 40% have sought suggestions about how to make their vote choices
  • 40% have looked up how to register to vote, check their registration, find their polling place or vote by mail

The fact-checking figure is notable: nearly three in four election-related chatbot users treat the tools as a verification layer for claims circulating elsewhere, rather than as a primary source of news. Pew also noted that among Americans who use chatbots at all, searching for information sits at the top of the list of what they use the tools for — a pattern that makes the low election-specific uptake stand out even more.

Age Remains the Sharpest Divide

Use of chatbots for election information largely tracks overall chatbot adoption, Pew reported. Adults under 50 — who are more likely to use chatbots in general — were roughly three times as likely to consult them about the election: 11% of adults under 50 say they have done so, compared with 4% of those 50 and older.

Pew noted that demographic differences in election-related chatbot use mostly parallel whether and how those groups use the tools at all, rather than reflecting a distinctive appetite for political queries among any particular group. In other words, the election gap looks less like chatbot skepticism about politics and more like the familiar age gradient that has shaped adoption of the tools generally.

Platforms Have Courted Voters Anyway

The modest adoption numbers arrive even as AI companies have spent the fall positioning their products as election resources. In an October 14 blog post titled "Preparing for the 2026 US midterms," Anthropic announced that Claude would draw official voting information from Democracy Works, a nonpartisan organization that aggregates data from state and local election sources — letting users get state-specific answers about where to vote or what ID to bring without leaving the conversation. OpenAI, meanwhile, has promoted ChatGPT's election information features as voters weigh ballot decisions.

The Pew data offers a broad measure of how much that outreach has moved actual behavior — and the answer is: not much, at least by self-reported usage. The gap between general chatbot adoption (about half of adults) and election-specific use (8%) indicates that most Americans still draw a line between asking a chatbot to draft an email and asking it how to vote.

Why the Numbers Matter for Election Integrity

Election officials and researchers have watched AI chatbots closely since 2024, when rapid adoption of generative tools raised concerns about misinformation, hallucinated polling place details and manipulated media. The major labs have responded with guardrails: routing election queries to official sources, refusing certain political requests and surfacing voting information from state authorities.

Pew's figures suggest those concerns have not translated into mass reliance on chatbots for civic information. But the survey's timing — two to three weeks before the midterms — means the 8% figure could still shift as turnout-focused voters begin making final decisions. A chatbot audience of 8% of adults also represents a substantial constituency — on the order of 20 million people, scaled to the size of the U.S. adult population — for errors or bias to operate on as the platforms court civic queries.

Methodology

The survey was conducted October 12-18, 2026, among 5,273 U.S. adults. All respondents are members of the Center's American Trends Panel, a probability-based online panel, and the results are weighted to represent the full U.S. adult population. Pew published its full questionnaire and methodology alongside the analysis, which was authored by research analyst Ted Van Green.

As with all self-reported surveys, the findings measure what Americans say they do, not logged behavior — and social desirability pressures around elections can cut in either direction. Still, the consistency of the age and usage patterns with Pew's prior chatbot research lends weight to the central conclusion: AI chatbots are now mainstream tools that most Americans have not yet folded into how they follow elections.

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