Bank Records Show Australians’ AI Subscriptions Up Nearly 13-Fold

The number of Westpac’s customers with AI subscriptions has grown from around 11,000 a month to more than 150,000 a month between 2023 and 2026.

The letters AI on a laptop screen (top) next to the logo of the AI Chatbot application on a smartphone screen in Frankfurt am Main, western Germany, on May 7, 2026. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP via Getty Images

Data from Westpac suggests the number of Australians opting to pay for an artificial intelligence “chatbot” has rocketed over the past three years.

The number of the bank’s customers with subscriptions grew from around 11,000 a month in March 2023 to more than 150,000 a month in March 2026. Westpac said it had handled approximately one million payments for AI subscriptions over the past year.