Construction AI use rises as privacy and security concerns hit 30%

A construction industry that once mostly watched artificial intelligence from the sidelines is now testing it at scale. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) says two-thirds of construction professionals used AI in some form over the past year, up from just over half in 2025. But the tools have not yet become part of most firms’ daily routines.

The divide is visible in the next numbers: 39% of organisations are running early-stage AI pilots, while regular AI use stands at only 19%. That regular-use figure has risen from 12%, and the proportion reporting no AI use has fallen by more than a third since 2025. RICS based its analysis on more than 3,100 responses from industry professionals worldwide.

The obstacles are becoming more concrete as adoption advances. Construction professionals’ concerns about AI privacy and security rose from 22% to 30% between 2025 and 2026. RICS links the increase to data-handling questions that appear when organisations move from testing a tool to using it regularly, alongside challenges involving integration, professional supervision and governance.

And concretely? For construction organisations, the immediate change is not an AI system suddenly running projects on its own. It is a shift from asking whether to experiment toward deciding how tools can be embedded into professional practice without losing control of data or oversight. The investment pipeline points in that direction: 37% of construction respondents plan to increase AI investment over the next 12 months.

The appetite is therefore growing alongside the caution. Maureen Ehrenberg, RICS president elect, said the profession had crossed from a period of limited adoption into one where responsibility must accompany wider use. RICS’s professional standard for responsible AI use in surveying practice came into effect in March 2026, while the EU AI Act provides wider European context as its provisions roll out in staggered phases between 2025 and 2028. Regular use remains a minority practice.