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Southeast Asia’s Digital Economy Set to Reach US$368B in 2026
The e Conomy SEA 2026 report projects Southeast Asia’s digital economy at US$368 billion in GMV in 2026, up 17% year on year. E commerce is forecast to be the largest sector at US$226 billion in GMV, while the report estimates 243 million people in the region use generative AI.
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Key takeaways
- The e Conomy SEA 2026 report projects Southeast Asia’s digital economy at US$368 billion in GMV in 2026, up 17% year on year.
- E commerce is forecast to be the largest sector at US$226 billion in GMV, while the report estimates 243 million people in the region use generative AI.
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openai.comCreate a landscape editorial hero image for this Studio Global article: According to the e-Conomy SEA report released on October 21, 2026, by Google, Temasek and Bain & Company, what are the projected size and ye. Article summary: South-east Asia’s digital economy is projected to reach US$368 billion in gross merchandise value (GMV) in 2026, up 17% year on year, according to the report released on October 21 by Google, Temasek and Bain & Company. . Topic tags: general, general web. Style: premium digital editorial illustration, source-backed research mood, clean composition, high detail, modern web publication hero. Use reference image context only for broad subject, composition, and topical grounding; do not copy the exact image. Avoid: logos, brand marks, copyrighted characters, real person likenesses, fake screenshots, UI text, readable text, watermarks, charts with fake numbers, clic
The e-Conomy SEA 2026 report projects Southeast Asia’s digital economy will reach US$368 billion in gross merchandise value (GMV) in 2026, a 17% increase year on year. The forecast comes as digital commerce expands and AI adoption accelerates, even amid economic and geopolitical uncertainty. 15
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What the regional forecast measures
GMV means the total value of goods and services sold through digital platforms. It is a measure of transaction value, not the revenue earned by those platforms. 6
The report also projects the region’s digital economy will reach about US$1.1 trillion by 2035. 4 Its stated coverage is ten Southeast Asian markets. One available report summary names Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, but does not establish the full list.
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The source material cited here does not provide a verified 2026 size or growth rate for Singapore specifically. It also does not establish ASEAN’s 2026–2027 GDP forecasts alongside global growth forecasts, so those comparisons cannot be made reliably here.
2026 sector forecasts
| Sector | Forecast value | Year-on-year growth |
|---|---|---|
| E-commerce | US$226 billion in GMV | 18% |
| Online travel | US$59 billion in GMV | 10% |
| Online media | US$44 billion in revenue | 22% |
| Mobility and food delivery | US$40 billion | 15% |
These figures come from a summary of the report. 2 The measures are not identical: online media is reported as revenue, while e-commerce and online travel are expressed as GMV. The available summaries do not provide verified 2025 sector baselines, so the year-on-year rates should not be used to infer exact prior-year values.
The report’s headline forecasts show growth across all four sectors, but the source material available here does not substantiate the detailed mechanisms sometimes associated with them—such as specific AI shopping features, travel-supply changes or advertising formats. Those claims need fuller report evidence before they can be stated as findings.
Generative AI: broad adoption, different measures of use
The report estimates that 243 million people in Southeast Asia use generative AI, equivalent to about 58% of the region’s working population. Google’s summary says adoption is scaling four times faster than the rollout of the internet; that is a comparison of adoption speed, not a measure of how intensively people use AI. 3
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To measure intensity, the report introduces AI usage in tokens. Tokens are the units an AI model processes when it reads prompts and generates responses. 17 A report summary puts average use across the six largest markets at about 5 million tokens per person, compared with 60 million in the United States.
17 Another summary says consumers account for about 60% of regional token use, largely for everyday work and study tasks.
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The figures describe different things: the user estimate indicates reach, while token usage offers a measure of activity. The available sources do not provide a verified Europe comparison or identify all six markets in the per-person token comparison.
Funding rose, but the comparison needs context
A Business Times report says Southeast Asia attracted US$21 billion in funding in the first half of 2026, with the increase attributed to two large data-centre deals. It reports an US$11 billion deal involving ST Telemedia Global Data Centres and a US$5 billion deal involving DayOne. 20
The same account compares the first half of 2026 with US$11 billion for all of 2025—different time periods, so this is not a like-for-like year-on-year comparison. The available material does not establish how much of the funding went to AI applications or provide a complete breakdown between data centres and digital companies. 20
What the figures do—and don’t—show
The clearest report-level takeaway is a forecast of continued regional expansion: US$368 billion in GMV in 2026, with growth projected across the listed digital sectors. AI adoption is already broad by the report’s estimate, but user reach and intensity of use are distinct measures.
Several details require fuller source material before they can be stated confidently, including Singapore’s separate forecast, the complete list of ten markets, the requested GDP comparisons and granular explanations of sector growth. The figures above should therefore be read as reported estimates and projections, not audited outcomes.
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The e Conomy SEA 2026 report projects Southeast Asia’s digital economy at US$368 billion in GMV in 2026, up 17% year on year. E commerce is forecast to be the largest sector at US$226 billion in GMV, while the report estimates 243 million people in the region use generative AI.
Sources
bain.comSoutheast Asia's digital economy set for $368B GMV in ...
businesstimes.com.sgSouth-east Asia digital economy to hit US$368 billion GMV in 2026, US$1.1 trillion in 2035: report
whtc.comSoutheast Asia digital sales set to rise by 17% in 2026, research shows
thestar.com.mySouth-East Asia's digital economy to reach a whopping US ...