The Future Is Bundled: Making GenAI Essential in Everyday Consumer Services

This IDC Market Perspective examines how bundling GenAI within music streaming, video streaming, fitness, and banking apps enables service providers to convert large free-user populations into higher-value customers. CMM data highlights substantial scale across users, buyers, and spending in these categories, with GenAI positioned to enhance engagement, deepen reliance, and unlock new opportunities for provider growth. Providers that move decisively will set the standard for consumer experience and secure competitive advantage as AI becomes a baseline expectation."Consumers adopt what reduces effort and increases value. When GenAI is embedded in services they already rely on for entertainment, wellness, or finance, it quickly becomes routine," says Kelly Brown, research manager, Consumer Market Model and Consumer Market Trends at IDC. "The result is deeper engagement, stronger retention, and new opportunities for providers to expand growth and loyalty. Those that move early will define the experience consumers come to expect, while laggards will struggle to compete once AI is assumed as part of the bundle."