Skift Meetings

Our new report, AI & the Future of Events, maps the gap between what AI-powered event tech promises and what it can currently deliver — for attendees, sponsors, and organizers. It profiles 130+ AI-native tools across six event phases and explains the structural difference between platforms built on AI from the ground up and legacy tools with a chatbot bolted on.

Almost every event tech tool claims to be AI-powered now. This report maps the risks plainly, alongside the real opportunities. Skift Meetings analyzed almost 700 event tech platforms to separate the useful from the frivolous or outright dangerous. This report features crucial insights for anyone making event tech procurement decisions right now. What’s inside: - Profiles of 130+ AI-native event tech tools mapped across six event phases. - The case for AI-native event tech leading shaping the future of events. - Imagining the ideal AI-powered event experience for attendees, sponsors, and organizers. - A plain-language explainer on LLMs, agentic AI, and MCP, written for practitioners, not technologists. - The key questions to ask and red flags to look out for when shopping for AI-powered event tech.

Most event professionals don't realize how much AI event tech is out there! We analyzed almost 700 event tech tools for our new report — including 130+ AI-native and another 170+ AI-enhanced. That's nearly half the event tech market claiming some form of AI capability. Knowing how to evaluate those claims is now a core planner skill. All our latest insights are included in our brand new report: AI & the Future of Events

This report cuts through the generational stereotypes to examine what's actually changing in event design — and what it costs when you get it wrong. What's inside: - Generational stereotypes are reductive, but ignoring generational data is a mistake - Why "designing for everyone" can mean designing for no one - Registration questions that unlock real personalization - How leading planners at are rethinking content, networking and measurement - What it takes to create intentional in-person connection at events - The ROI case for multigenerational design — and how to make it to leadership

This isn't a report about generational stereotypes. It's about the concrete decisions — in registration, programming, networking, and measurement — that determine whether your event works for the audience you'll have in 2030.

A new guide, created in partnership with Louisville Tourism, looks at how planners are moving beyond traditional session formats — using Bourbon City’s compact downtown and local partnerships to rethink where and how meetings take place. This shift extends beyond education. It’s also about experiencing bourbon-led programming, seeing horses round the final turn at Churchill Downs, and introducing attendees to local artists and craftspeople — all in a city where affordability gives planners more room to experiment.