Third of UK insurers lagging behind on personalisation as ‘AI execution gap’ grows

A third of UK insurers (30%) admit they are significantly lagging behind customer expectations around personalisation. 

This is according to Earnix’s new report ’Insurance 2026: Earnix AI Trends Bulletin – UK Survey Results In Depth’, released 11 June, which revealed that over half (55%) of UK insurers have integrated artificial intelligence (AI) into some core business functions.

Based on insights from more than 400 global insurance executives for the ’Earnix 2026 Industry Trends Report’, including 40 UK insurance leaders, the UK regional report also showed that 98% of UK insurers are either already using, or planning to use, generative AI for processing unstructured data – which is significantly ahead of the global average.

Earnix said that the findings show that while UK insurers are accelerating AI adoption, many are now confronting the industry’s growing “AI execution gap”. 

Adrian Mincher, head of UK, Ireland and South Africa at Earnix, said: ”There’s no shortage of ambition or investment across the market, but many firms are still finding it difficult to turn insight into action at scale.

”That’s especially visible around personalisation, where customer expectations are moving quickly and operational processes are struggling to keep up. The conversation around AI is becoming far more practical now – less about testing the technology and more about whether insurers can bridge the execution gap and actually embed AI confidently and at scale into the way decisions get made every day.”

Innovation challenges

Earnix’s new report also revealed that over half of UK insurers (53%) said that regulation is moderately slowing AI innovation.

Meanwhile, it highlighted that 91% of UK insurers plan to increase investment in third-party data. 

Commenting on the report findings, Mincher added: “UK insurers have clearly moved beyond experimenting with AI in isolated pilots.

”What comes through strongly in this research is that the pressure has shifted to making AI work consistently in the real world – inside pricing, underwriting, claims and customer decision-making, where speed, governance and commercial performance all matter at the same time.”