Lisbon, June 17, 2025 (Lusa) - The Portuguese are more comfortable with the moderate application of artificial intelligence (AI) by the media, in which journalists are in charge and technology provides support, in a hybrid model, according to the Digital News Report Portugal 2025 (DNRPT25) released on Tuesday.
Men, young people between the ages of 18–24, people with high levels of education and media literacy tend to be more open to the use of AI in journalism, the study also concludes.
In the last two years (2024–2025), “the debate on the impact of AI on journalism has intensified, in a context of rapid consolidation of these technologies at a global level,” highlights the DNRPT25.
According to the report, “Portuguese people are more comfortable with the moderate application of AI — that is, with journalists in charge and AI in support — than with news produced mainly by AI with some human supervision (34% vs. 17% of declared comfort)”.
In scenarios with greater automation, rejection is “significantly higher”, with almost half (47%) “declaring discomfort with news produced mainly by AI, compared to 27% when production is done by journalists with some technological assistance”.
The level of acceptance of AI varies according to socio-demographic profile: “men, young people (especially 18–24 years old), people with high levels of education and individuals with media literacy training tend to be more open to the use of AI in journalism,” the document reads.
In terms of perceptions of the impact of AI on the quality of information, the report points out that “the Portuguese highlight aspects such as greater speed and reduced production costs (28% and 27%, respectively)”.
However, “they show strong scepticism about the potential of AI to improve aspects such as trust, accuracy and impartiality of news — only 17% believe that AI will make news more reliable, while 35% believe it will have a negative impact in this regard”.
The report stresses that “the high proportion of neutral or undecided responses reinforces the idea that there is still a great deal of ignorance about the concrete applications of AI in journalism”.
Regarding the type of applications preferred, interest in format features such as summarisation, news translation and personalised recommendations leads the way, to the detriment of synthetic content (produced by artificial intelligence).
“Content personalisation based on past experience is well accepted, especially in the case of weather (67%), but comfort is lower when it comes to social media or sports,” the study says.
In summary, “acceptance is higher among young people, people with higher incomes and individuals with higher education or media literacy training”.
The DNRPT25 has been produced annually by OberCom - Observatório da Comunicação since 2015, published alongside the global report by RISJ - Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom.
This is the 10th annual report of the Digital News Report Portugal.
With fieldwork carried out by YouGov, the project surveyed around 97,000 Internet users in 48 countries worldwide in 2025. This year, Serbia joins the group of global markets under study, following the inclusion of Morocco in 2024.
The fieldwork took place between January 13, 2025 and February 24, 2025.
In Portugal, 2,012 individuals were surveyed.
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