As AI continues to transform creative workflows, concern remains over the impact that it will have on the sector. A new report now suggests that any savings the companies might achieve by replacing creative staff could have a significant hidden cost further down the line.
AI branding disasters from Coca-Cola's Christmas advert to the withdrawn McDonald's advert and the Starbucks controversy in South Korea remind us that when it comes to reliance on AI, human judgment is vital. But where will that ability come from if entry-level positions disappear due to AI?
That's one of the key questions raised in a new study by D&AD, a global creative non-profit dedicated to excellence in design and commercial creativity. The D&AD AI & Creativity Report 2026 is based on 197 in-depth conversations with global creative leaders from 30 countries, alongside an analysis of over 10,000 D&AD Award entries.
The findings are distilled into six "critical reckonings" that the authors suggest will define whether today's creative leaders choose to build a stronger industry. The headline argument is this need to preserve human judgement.
We're continually reminded that AI can't replace human creativity; it just speeds up the most repetitive tasks. But that shortcut could also have a cost, the report warns. The repetitive tasks are where tomorrow's leaders have traditionally built their skills. If those positions are taken by AI, where do people get the training and experience to be able to form the level of judgment needed to be tomorrow's creative leaders?
"While entry-level jobs are disappearing, AI is simultaneously absorbing the remaining repetitive tasks. Together, this is eliminating the training ground that builds the judgement required for future creative leaders," the report warns,
The proportion of D&AD Award entries declaring the use of AI has more than doubled year-on-year, reaching 27.6% in 2026. Generative AI was used in 56.2% of AI-declaring entries overall, compared with 44.7% of AI-declaring Pencil winners, alongside a proportional rise in assistive AI among winners.
The report highlights that AI can be most impactful when it's invisible beneath, citing how projects like ‘Caption with Intention’ and ‘PainVisible’ have used AI to drive inclusivity. But the data suggests that while AI is increasingly part of the creative process, its use alone does not translate into creative excellence.
"AI has made creative work faster and cheaper, but if you treat it as a shortcut, you just get average output. The real value – and the D&AD Awards data backs this up – comes from skilled human judgement using AI to sharpen human craft, not replace it," the report states.
"But that judgment has to come from somewhere, and right now the industry is cutting off its own supply. The entry-level jobs where people learn to build judgment are disappearing. The fix isn't to protect those jobs as they are – it's to redesign them, so they still teach the judgment the industry depends on."
Six critical areas
Six aspects were identified as the areas that will define whether the choices made lead AI to become a shortcut to average work or a catalyst for creative excellence.: originality, speed, value, talent, governance and leadership.
On originality, the study suggests that AI on its own trends towards the average. Award-winning work emerges when specialist AI tools are paired with discerning human judgement and craft.
This is where talent comes in. The report suggests that as repetitive tasks disappear, organisations face a defining choice: use AI to replace learning opportunities or redesign junior roles around critique, taste and cultural awareness. Meanwhile, leaders are rolling out AI tools they don't fully understand themselves.
"AI has changed what bad work looks like," says D&AD CEO David Patton. "It's no longer lazy or derivative in any obvious way – it's competent, polished, and generic, and it's the default output for anyone, anywhere. The real problem sits one step earlier: how do you train someone to tell competent from excellent, when competent is now the easy default everywhere they look? This report isn't just a diagnostic of risk. It's D&AD planting a flag – not for the tools, or against them, but for the human judgment they can't replace."
The report also questions that if AI has made speed standard, what are clients paying for? It finds that 70% of agencies haven't changed what they charge, even though AI has made their work faster. The efficiency gain has transferred to clients, but the most successful agencies are reportedly using the shift to charge for the decision and IP, not the delivery.
The D&AD AI & Creativity Report concludes that AI is not determining the future of creative excellence, but the choices that organisations make about how they use it are. It also finds that while many brands and creative agencies worry about AI ethics, most but haven't put any kind of policy down in writing. That might be one of the first things to change to support clearer decisions and stronger internal trust.
You can download the full report from the D&AD website.
