Amid AI shift, 79% of CX leaders consider switching outsourcing providers
While 83 per cent of customer experience (CX) leaders report higher satisfaction with their outsourcing providers, just 17 per cent say they’re seeing best practices or getting strategic guidance from them, according to research published by SupportNinja.
The Austin, Tex.-based outsourcing services provider surveyed more than 400 senior leaders to produce its 2026 CX Outsourcing Report.
SupportNinja found 54 per cent of CX leaders expect their outsourcing partners to play a larger role in driving innovation and strategy. The quest for AI expertise may be a significant opportunity here: less than a quarter of those surveyed have fully operationalized the technology across core CX workflows, and 93 per cent are looking for outsourcers who can apply AI to processes.
Brands have more money to hand off some of their CX work to third parties, according to the report. For instance, 70 per cent said they had increased their outsourcing budget, a jump from 61 per cent the year before. Only five percent saw a decrease in outsourcing spend.
So far, nearly half of those surveyed said they’re using AI to drive self-service, and 47 per cent are providing the technology to empower their service reps. Overall, a lack of data readiness was the most cited AI challenged, cited by 34 per cent.
“For 2026, the mandate is clear: Treat AI as an operating shift, not a standalone technology deployment,” the report’s authors wrote. “That requires partners capable of integrating people, process, and technology, especially in environments where vendors own significant portions of day-to-day execution.”
360 Magazine Insight
When a majority of CX leaders say they’re considering changing outsourcers, it may simply signal an intention to keep their options open and to conduct a more thorough assessment of whether they’re seeing value from the relationship.
The truth is that generative and agentic AI are still so new (and developing so quickly) that few outsourcers would have a proven track record in implementing across core CX processes. We are still largely in trial and error territory, where outsourcers’ opportunity to shine lies in their knowledge of change management.
AI may, in fact, offer an incentive to stick with the status quo in terms of outsourcing partners. It’s not always easy to switch from one firm to another, and there can be significant growing pains as an organization helps an outsourcer understand its unique business needs, operational interdependencies and culture.
It’s curious that the research fails to raise, let alone answer, a key question likely at the top of many CX leaders’ minds: can agentic AI reduce the dependency on outsourcers by taking on some of their traditional tasks? The answer may be “No” today, but the future is just as uncertain as it is for many full-time roles.
That said, there’s a lot of useful data in this gated 29-page report that could help inform outsourcing discussions, including a detailed action plan to optimize outsourcing relationships to deliver maximum value.
