Norway is the country where most people pay for AI services
Norway has the highest share of people paying for AI services among the nine countries in a new study from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford. 26 percent of Norwegians pay for at least one AI service, whether privately or through work or school, compared with an average of 18 percent across the nine countries. Norway is also the country with the highest willingness to pay for news. The study maps how people use AI and what they think about its use in journalism. It is the first time Norway has taken part, and the foundation Fritt Ord took the initiative to include it.
Norwegians are sceptical of AI-made news, though not strongly so. 66 percent are comfortable with news produced entirely by journalists, while only 14 percent are comfortable with news made entirely by AI. 37 percent think news media's use of AI will make society worse, against 25 percent who think it will make it better. Those who know the most about AI are the most wary: 39 percent of those with the highest AI knowledge scores are very uncomfortable with fully AI-made news, versus 20 percent of those with the lowest scores. More than one in three Norwegians say they often or very often come across content they believed was real but turned out to be AI-generated.
So far there is no sign that AI is weakening willingness to pay for news. 41 percent of Norwegians paid for online news in the past year. The people who pay for AI are the same ones who pay for journalism, and the heaviest news users are also the heaviest users of AI for news. Among those who use AI for information weekly, 47 percent say it does not affect their willingness to pay for news, 9 percent are less willing and 7 percent more willing.
Fritt Ord's Tellef S. Raabe says the open question is what happens once ordinary people use AI services for news purposes. The report's authors describe AI as becoming part of the information infrastructure rather than just a tool. YouGov surveyed about 2,000 people in each country; in Norway, 2,117 responded between 14 August and 28 September 2026.