Limelight Software, a cloud FP&A platform provider, today released its 2026 FP&A Statistics Report, drawing on more than 50 benchmarks from research by Gartner, PwC, KPMG, McKinsey, Deloitte, and others. The report paints a picture of a finance function caught between rising technology investment and legacy workflows that continue to slow progress.
Key findings indicate that FP&A technology spending is climbing fast. According to the report, 77% of CFOs and senior finance leaders plan to increase FP&A technology spending in 2025, with 47% expecting a 10%+ increase versus 2024, based on Gartner data. The FP&A software market is projected to grow from $3.9 billion in 2023 to $9.7 billion by 2031.
AI adoption is set to more than double within 12 months. Currently, 28% of finance departments use AI in forecasting, while another 39% plan to adopt it within the next year, according to PwC. The AI in FP&A market alone is projected to grow at a 34.8% CAGR through 2034.
Despite these investments, spreadsheets remain near universal. Almost 100% of FP&A professionals still use spreadsheets for monthly planning and reporting, as reported by the AFP. Over half of FP&A teams now manage eight or more data categories and 10 or more reporting tools each quarter.
Forecast accuracy is the top cost-control obstacle, with 61% of CFOs saying inaccurate forecasting is the single biggest barrier to controlling costs, according to SAP Concur. Additionally, 82% of companies make decisions based on stale information, and 85% say outdated data leads directly to lost revenue.
Transformation programs are stalling, with 69% of finance transformation initiatives progressing slower than planned. Thirty percent fail to hit their goals outright, most often due to poor change management, per Gartner.
The CFO role keeps expanding, as 82% of CFOs say their remit has grown significantly over the past five years, according to Egon Zehnder. Eighty-one percent now see themselves as the primary drivers of business growth, and 50% are planning a finance restructure.
AI is reshaping forecasting first. Sixty-six percent of finance leaders say generative AI will have the biggest immediate impact on explaining forecast and budget variances, according to Gartner. Fifty-five percent of retail and CPG finance leaders are already using Gen AI in their forecasting workflows.
Rosie Shea, BDM at Limelight Software, commented: "Finance leaders in 2026 are being pulled in two directions. They're expected to drive strategy, sponsor digital transformation, and accelerate ROI, while still spending most of their week pulling numbers out of spreadsheets. The teams pulling ahead have stopped tolerating that gap. They've centralised their planning data, automated the manual work, and put AI on real forecasting problems rather than treating it as a science project."
Shea added: "What the data really shows is a distance between intent and infrastructure. CFOs are committing larger budgets to FP&A technology and accelerating AI adoption. But nearly 100% of finance professionals are still working in spreadsheets, and 61% point to forecast accuracy as their biggest cost-control problem. Closing that gap is the work of the next two years."
The full report is available at Limelight's FP&A Statistics Report.
