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# The Department of Defense accounted for 74.1% of US federal AI contract and OTA spending in 2024
- URL: https://aiadoption.org/data/us-ai-contract-spending-by-agency/
- Published: 2026-10-19T16:45:48.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-21T06:03:27.000Z
- Description: The Department of Defense funded 74.1% of US federal AI contract and OTA spending in 2024, and more than half in every year since 2013 except 2016. The Treasury was second at 7.2%.
- Author: Manu
- Tags: Data, AI Regulation, AI in the US, #chart, #ai-index-2026, #hub-regulation, #country-us, #industry-government

74.1%

▲ 22.1 pts since 2013

Department of Defense share of US federal AI contract and OTA spending in 2024

20132024

## What the chart shows

The Department of Defense funded 74.1% of US federal spending on AI-related contracts and other transaction agreements (OTAs) in 2024\. The Department of the Treasury (7.2%) and the Department of Veterans Affairs (5.1%) were a distant second and third.

The Defense Department has had more than half of this spending in every year since 2013 except 2016 (46.5%), with highs of 82.2% in 2014 and 82.1% in 2020\. All other agencies together had 13.6% in 2024, led by Health and Human Services (3.6%) and Homeland Security (3.3%).

## Key numbers

| Measure                              | Value |
| ------------------------------------ | ----- |
| Department of Defense, 2024          | 74.1% |
| Department of Defense, 2013          | 51.9% |
| Department of Defense, 2016 (low)    | 46.5% |
| Department of the Treasury, 2024     | 7.2%  |
| Department of Veterans Affairs, 2024 | 5.1%  |
| All other agencies, 2024             | 13.6% |

## How to read it

- Shares of each year’s spending on AI-related contracts and OTAs; that spending came to $0.81B in 2024 ([related chart](https://aiadoption.org/data/us-public-ai-spending-by-year/)).
- “Other” combines NASA, Homeland Security, Health and Human Services and the agencies the AI Index groups as other.
- The AI Index text also gives the Department of Defense 73% of contract and OTA spending over 2013–2024; that cumulative share is not in the data file.

**Source:** [AI Index](https://aiadoption.org/sources/#ai-index), 2026, via the AI Index Report 2026 (Stanford HAI), figure 8.5.6: *Public spending on AI-related contracts + OTAs (% of total) in the United States by funding agency, 2013–24*. Chart and text by AI Adoption.  
Numbers checked against the published data on 20 October 2026.  
[Download the data (CSV)](https://charts.aiadoption.org/ai-index/csv/us-ai-contract-spending-by-agency.csv?ref=aiadoption.org) · [Cite this chart](#source)