Similarweb data from January 2, 2026, shows a market that is still dominated by one name, even if the gap is closing for the first time in years. ChatGPT holds 64.5% of the market. While that number is lower than its historical peaks, it is important to look at the context rather than just the percentage. The total number of users for OpenAI’s flagship has actually gone up. It remains the default choice and the name synonymous with AI for the general public.
Market share distribution as of January 2, 2026. Source: Similarweb.
The real story of 2026 is Google. Gemini has surged to 21.5%. This is where most of the market shift has landed. The release of Gemini 3 combined with the Nano Banana and Nano Banana Pro models has given Google a much better product for many tasks. While it is not leading in every single category, it is finally a model that competes head-to-head. The sleeping giant is awake, and 2026 looks like it will continue to be a strong year for them.
DeepSeek sits at 3.7%. These users mostly represent people who heard the model was better at a specific point in time and simply stayed there. It is a floor of usage driven more by habit than active awareness of the current state of the art. Grok follows closely at 3.4%. This group is largely composed of people who want the tool associated with Elon Musk or those who prefer the interface. Interestingly, Grok remains a better model for specific, strange tasks that other models fail at for reasons that are not entirely clear.
Perplexity and Claude both sit at 2.0%. For Perplexity, this reflects its success as a search product. People like it as a tool for a specific job. For Claude, the 2.0% figure is a bit misleading. Similarweb tracks web traffic on the main chatbot site, but the majority of Claude’s actual value and usage happens through developer tools like Claude Code and the API. If you want to see how that ecosystem is changing, you can look at my thoughts on Claude Code and Opus 4.5. The web traffic doesn’t tell the full story of Claude’s footprint.
Finally, Microsoft’s Copilot is at 1.1%. It is an underperformer. Despite the massive distribution advantage of the Microsoft ecosystem, the product itself has not managed to capture the same preference as ChatGPT or the rising Gemini. It shows that being everywhere doesn’t matter if the experience is perceived as subpar.
Comparing these shifts to my 2026 AI predictions, we are seeing the consolidation of the ‘big two’ while smaller players fight for niche relevance. ChatGPT is the anchor, but Google is now the clear challenger. The rest of the field is essentially noise for the average consumer, even if tools like Claude are indispensable for developers. If you are choosing based on cost and quality, the choice between Gemini 3 Flash and GPT-5 variants is the primary decision most will face this year.
