{"id":12819,"date":"2026-11-05T13:00:42","date_gmt":"2026-11-05T13:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/?p=12819"},"modified":"2026-11-05T13:00:42","modified_gmt":"2026-11-05T13:00:42","slug":"social-monitor-romania-ranks-last-in-eu-for-artificial-intelligence-use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/?p=12819","title":{"rendered":"Social Monitor: Romania ranks last in EU for artificial intelligence use"},"content":{"rendered":"

Romania ranks last in the European Union for the use of artificial intelligence by both individuals and companies, according to an analysis<\/a> by the Social Monitor (Monitorul Social), a project of Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Romania. The report linked the low adoption rate to a wider deficit in basic digital skills.<\/p>\n

Only 17.8% of Romanians aged 16 to 74 used generative AI tools in 2025, compared with an EU average of 32.7%. Denmark led the bloc with a rate of 48.4%, according to Eurostat data cited in the report.<\/p>\n

The difference was greater in the workplace. Just 5.2% of Romanians used generative AI for professional purposes, compared with 15.4% across the EU.<\/p>\n

A similar share of Romanian companies with at least ten employees – 5.2% – used some form of AI technology. The EU average was 20%, meaning Romanian businesses currently use AI less than European companies did in 2021, when the bloc-wide rate stood at 7.7%, the same source revealed.<\/p>\n

The Social Monitor linked this performance to Romania\u2019s low level of digital literacy. Only 31.8% of the population had basic or above-basic digital skills in 2025, the lowest share in the EU and well below the European average of 60.4%.<\/p>\n

The report argued that Romania\u2019s economic development alone could not explain the gap. Bulgaria, Greece, Latvia, Slovakia, and Hungary have lower GDP per capita in purchasing-power terms but perform better in both digital skills and AI adoption.<\/p>\n

Greece, for example, has a GDP per capita equivalent to 68% of the EU average, compared with Romania\u2019s 78%, yet 44.1% of Greeks used generative AI.<\/p>\n

Plus, Internet access does not fully account for the difference either. Among people who had used the internet during the previous three months, only 19.1% in Romania had used generative AI, compared with 34.8% across the EU.<\/p>\n

\u201cMore concerning is the fact that Romania is not catching up. Between 2021 and 2025, the share of Romanians with basic digital skills increased from 27.8% to 31.8%, more slowly than the EU27 average, which rose from 53.9% to 60.4%, meaning the gap widened. At this pace, Romania would reach the European target of 80% of the population having basic digital skills only in approximately 48 years, rather than in 2030,\u201d reads the report.<\/p>\n

The gap between Romanian companies and the EU average in AI adoption also more than doubled between 2021 and 2025, from 6.3 to 14.7 percentage points.<\/p>\n

Young Romanians also ranked last in the EU. Some 44.1% of those aged 16 to 24 used generative AI, compared with a European average of 63.8%, while the rate among Romanian students was 53.5%, against 72% across the bloc.<\/p>\n

University graduates were the only group approaching the EU average, with usage rates of 41% in Romania and 49% across the bloc. However, the report noted that Romania has the EU\u2019s lowest share of young people with tertiary education.<\/p>\n

The Social Monitor warned that without sustained investment in education and adult training, weak digital skills could turn Romania\u2019s technological delay into a new source of inequality and prevent much of the workforce from benefiting from AI-driven productivity gains.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Romania ranks last in the European Union for the use of artificial intelligence by both individuals and companies, according to an analysis by the Social Monitor (Monitorul Social), a project of Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Romania. The report linked the low adoption rate to a wider deficit in basic digital skills. Only 17.8% of Romanians aged 16 to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12819\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ofero.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}