Vivrato, a games industry consultancy, released its VAIA Report 2026 on Oct. 20, finding that 97% of the 101 studio leaders it interviewed have used AI in some form during development. Yet more than half rate how deeply AI is built into their full production pipeline at three or lower out of ten.
The report, from Vivrato’s AI research vertical VAIA Games AI Research & Advisory, rests on 101 confidential interviews with senior studio leaders and decision makers, conducted from April to September 2026. Vivrato says 94% use AI in at least one of nine production stages. The median pipeline-depth rating is 3 out of 10, and 52% rate it at 3 or lower.
Studios Adopt AI Across Nine Production Stages
The most common use is code and engineering, covering engine, tools and gameplay code, at 86%. General productivity tasks such as documentation, email, meetings and planning follow at 83%, then concept and pre-production at 79%.
| Production stage | Share of studios using AI |
|---|---|
| Code and engineering | 86% |
| General productivity | 83% |
| Concept and pre-production | 79% |
| Design and prototyping | 68% |
| Art, assets and animation | 60% |
More than half of studios also use AI for QA and testing and for narrative and world building. Analytics and player data, and LiveOps and monetisation, show the lowest adoption.
Reported — 97% of studio leaders have used AI, but over half say it isn't deeply built in.✅ 94% use it in at least one of 9 production stages✅ 52% rate that depth 3/10 or lower✅ Art, assets & animation: Europe 70%, North America 53%Per the Vivrato VAIA Report, via VGC pic.twitter.com/bwMMoIe65m
European Studios Rate Integration Deeper
Europe leads on depth. European studios, with the UK included, give themselves an average pipeline-integration score of 4.2 out of 10, against 3.5 in North America. They also report more AI use in code and engineering, design and prototyping, art, assets and animation, and analytics and player data.
The sample skews to those two regions: the interviews were held primarily with studios headquartered in North America and Europe.
Adam Boyes Questions Generative AI Focus
The interviews covered six types of AI: generative, rules-based automation, fine-tuned or custom-trained models, classical machine learning, retrieval-augmented systems and agentic systems. Vivrato said a studio’s view of generative AI isn’t treated as its view of AI overall.
Vivrato founder and CEO Adam Boyes argues the public debate has narrowed the topic too far.
We’ve noticed this year, public discourse and definitions about AI in games usually defaults to generative AI: chatbots, image generation, and synthetic voices.
Adam Boyes, founder and CEO of Vivrato
Boyes pointed to uses that rarely make headlines, from machine learning that predicts player churn to rules-based automation in testing, and said results differ widely. He said that makes this the right moment to set a clear baseline.
In his view, the question is no longer who uses AI but where they’re using it, what is changing, what’s actually helping, and where teams are still running into challenges.
VAIA Study Methodology and Commercial Editions
Vivrato describes VAIA as a structured interview study, not an online survey. Every conversation followed the same 44-question guide across the same nine stages. Answers are anonymized and reported only in aggregate, and the company says independent games-research analysts reviewed the research. Founded in 2024 by Boyes, Vivrato is a consultancy that advises publishers and studios.
A free 2026 VAIA Snapshot is available at vivrato.com/vaia. The full report comes in two editions: a Studio Report that benchmarks a studio against its size cohort (1 to 24, 25 to 100, or 101+ people), and an Enterprise Report with a data annex, new interviews inside the client’s organization and an in-person session with the research team.
Depth ratings are self-reported by the leaders interviewed, marking how the 101 studios reported their practices between April and September 2026.