The adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) technology rises with an increase in company size, as reported by the National Statistics Institute (INE). Approximately 49.1% of companies with 250 or more employees utilize these technologies, followed by 18.2% of firms with 50 to 249 employees, and 9.4% of businesses with 10 to 49 employees. These figures represent an increase of 7.2, 2.8, and 2.7 points compared to 2024, respectively.
Among these companies, the most common application is written language analysis, used by 59.4%, followed by image, video, and sound/audio generation (50.9%) and the generation of written, spoken, or programming code language (45.6%).
By sector, the highest usage rates of such technology are observed in information and communication (52.8%), other services (19.4%), and transport and storage (14.8%). Conversely, the construction and real estate activities sector records the lowest proportion (5.5%), although all sectors show increases from 2024, with transport and storage notably rising by 9.9 points.
Among companies not utilizing AI technologies, 12.3% are considering future adoption, which is an increase of 2.8 points from 2024.
The primary reasons cited for not using AI include inadequate knowledge within the company (74.4%), perceived excessive costs (60.4%), lack of clarity about legal consequences, particularly regarding liability for damages caused by AI use (57.3%), and concerns over data protection and privacy violations (55.4%).
Moreover, this year, 98.8% of businesses have access to the internet (both fixed and mobile) for professional purposes, marking an increase of 0.8 points compared to 2024. The transport and storage sectors achieved 100% access, with the commerce sector close behind at 99.8%, while the accommodation and food service sector had the lowest at 95.8%.
Of the companies with internet access, 51.1% of employees have professional usage access, which is a 0.6-point increase from 2024. The information and communication sector remains the leader at 93.7%, whereas construction and real estate activities retain the lowest proportion at 34.2%.
In 2025, 62.9% of companies have their own website or belong to an economic group that does, increasing by 0.5 points from 2023. Within these, 77.3% provide descriptions of goods or services and/or price lists, and 49.9% offer content in more than one language.
Only 13.5% of companies with a website provide online order tracking.
In 2024, e-commerce sales accounted for 20.6% of the total business turnover in Portugal, showing an increase of 1.1 points compared to 2023. The total sales value reached approximately 83.9 billion euros, reflecting a 9.8% increase over the previous year. Despite Portugal having lower proportions compared to the European Union (EU) in 2020 and 2021, it surpassed the EU average in 2022 and 2023.
