Accounts payable is entering a new era. After years of focusing on digitization and process automation, organizations are now applying artificial intelligence to improve decision-making, accelerate workflows, and transform AP into a more intelligent, data-driven business function.
This article series is based on the findings from State of AP 2026: AI Rising, a new research report sponsored by Medius and xSuite. Drawing on the perspectives of 194 accounts payable, P2P, and finance leaders, the research explores how organizations are adopting AI, where they are realizing the greatest value, the operational challenges they continue to face, and the capabilities that distinguish top-performing AP organizations.
Throughout this series, we’ll examine the report’s most important findings, including the current state of AP, emerging AI use cases, automation trends, AI readiness and maturity, and the strategies leading organizations are using to prepare for more autonomous finance operations. Whether your organization is beginning its AI journey or expanding existing initiatives, these articles will provide research-backed insights to help guide the next phase of AP transformation.
In Part Six of our series, we explore how accounts payable leaders are prioritizing AI primarily to automate repetitive tasks and reduce manual effort across high-volume processes. However, as adoption matures, their focus is shifting toward leveraging AI-driven data insights for advanced forecasting, cash management, and strategic decision-making.
How AP Leaders View AI: Efficiency First, Strategy Next
The objectives AP leaders bring to their AI investments in 2026 reveal a function that is both pragmatic and ambitious. Automating tasks leads by a decisive margin, cited by 74% of respondents as a top-two objective. The priority is understandable. Accounts payable manages high transaction volumes through processes that are often repetitive, rules-based, and time-intensive. AI’s most immediate value lies in helping organizations reduce manual effort, accelerate processing, and improve operational efficiency.
Efficiency gains through budget and headcount reduction follow at 46%, reflecting the ongoing pressure many organizations face to do more with limited resources. Yet the broader opportunity may be less about reducing staff and more about increasing capacity. As AP’s responsibilities continue to expand, many leaders view AI as a means of allowing existing teams to accomplish more rather than simply accomplish the same work more efficiently.
The third and fourth objectives point toward the next stage of AI adoption. Better forecasting and predictive capabilities, cited by 31% of respondents, and improved cash management and savings at 28% suggest that organizations increasingly view AI as more than an automation tool. They see it as a means of improving decision-making. The focus begins to shift from processing transactions more efficiently to generating better insight from the data those transactions create.
Organizations are entering the AI era by automating work. The more consequential prize is what comes after: using the intelligence that automation creates to make faster, better-informed decisions across the AP lifecycle. The priorities in this year’s research suggest both journeys are already underway, and that the distance between them is shorter than many AP leaders expect.
Access this exclusive research today by downloading the State of AP 2026: AI Rising report now.
