2026市场研究趋势

Introduction A billion-dollar industryat a crossroads Market research is having a moment—a big one. The global insights economyjust topped $150 billion USD, according toEsomar’s latestGlobal Market ResearchReport. The biggest driver of growth? Therapid rise of research software, whichsurged 11.5% year over year to exceed $62billion USD. A new chapter for insights This combination oftechnological accelerationand emotional expectationis reshaping what “goodresearch” looks like. Sometraditions are beingreimagined. Others are provingtheir staying power. Greenbook’s2025 GRIT Insights PracticeReporttells a similar story: full-servicefirms are finding their footing again. Thereal standouts, though, are the onescombining technology and humanconnection to deliver insights that arefaster, richer and more relevant. 2026 is not just about usingmore AI or collecting moredata. It’s about redefiningquality: how insights aregenerated, shared and actedupon. Meanwhile,WARC’s 2025 ConsumerTrends ReportandReach3’s Trade Windsboth show a world of consumers caughtbetween caution and fatigue. People wantbrands that see and understand them. The following seven trendshighlight how leading insightteams are balancing innovationwith intention, moving theindustry forward while stayingtrue to what makes researchvaluable in the first place. And marketers? They’re asking forinsights that feel more human, moreemotional and more grounded in real life. TREND 1 AI: Full steam ahead(with a healthy dose of skepticism) From hype to habit AI has officially moved from an industry headline to an everyday habit. Accordingto Greenbook’s 2025 GRIT Insights Practice Report, high-performing suppliers nowautomate an average of 5.1 project functions using AI. Research teams are using AI to draft reports, transcribe interviews, clusterqualitative themes, and uncover patterns that would have taken weeks to findmanually. But for others, it’s also a strategic thinking partner. “As insights leaders, we aim to take a holistic view of the business because our workunderpins the organization’s key objectives,” explains Teresa Correa-Pavlat,Insights & Analytics Lead and AI Agile Capabilities at Haleon, in The Next Era ofInsights Report. “This is why AI fits so naturally. It allows us to connect the dotsacross a wider set of data and even illuminate the need for data ecosystems to helpus. With it, we can stretch our curiosity further, move faster, and still stay groundedin the signals and truths that matter.” Researchers are finding ways to let AI handlethe heavy lifting while they focus oninterpretation, creativity and storytelling. “AI has brought back theDIY culture. Anyone cango from an idea to a proofof concept in a matter ofhours or days, with littlerisk. If there was ever atime to design and build theproducts of the future, it isnow. AI is the collaboratorthat makes it possible.” Kerry Sette, Vice President and Head ofConsumer Insights & Research at VoyaFinancial, sees this evolution as anopportunity to make research more accessibleand actionable across organizations. Shesays: “Artificial intelligence is transformingdata gathering—accelerating speed, reducingcost and reshaping how decisions are made. Ibelieve it’s going to help democratize data andanalysis and help unlock that more holisticview of the customer.” Graeme Ford, Founder& Innovation Consultant,PunkMRX Are researchers actually using AI? Short answer: yes, and fast. In our annual Market Research Trends survey, conductedusingRival’s conversational research platform, researchers reported steady adoptionacross teams, a trend that aligns with research from industry experts like MRII. believe AI will improve theirjobs in the coming years say “most” or “some” of theirteam is already using AI — Market Research InstituteInternational, “AI in Focus 2025” — Market Research InstituteInternational, “AI in Focus 2025” of researchers say the numberof AI tools they’re usingincreased in 2025 of researchers are excitedfor AI-assisted analysisand reporting — Rival Technologies,November 2025 — Rival Technologies,November 2025 AI is moving from sideproject to The quantification of qual One area seeing a major leap forward is qualitative research. AI is revolutionizing howwe capture and analyze unstructured feedback and speeding up tasks that once tookmany, many hours to complete. Today, AI tools can help automatically prompt participants to share more. In a recentresearch-on-research studyfrom Rival Technologies, Reach3 Insights and Angus ReidGroup, qualitative feedback collected through conversational methods producedopen-ended responses that were 2.5x longer than those from traditional surveys. AddAI-driven probes and video, and that depth increases nearly eightfold. On the analysis front, AI can transcribe, summarize, and detect patterns in minutes.Those richer stories don’t just make insights more vivid. They give AI better materialto learn from, leading to clearer summaries and st