US R1 AI Policy Audit 2026
A complete census: every one of America's 187 Carnegie R1 research universities, checked for officially published AI guidance.
Standardized, not banned
178 of 187 (95.2%) publish an AI policy or official guidance. Exactly one — the University of Wyoming — confirmed it has none. Eight were unverifiable from public domains.
The headline is not the 95%. It is the shape of the consensus: the US research sector did not ban AI, did not ignore it, and did not leave it to individual faculty. It standardized on governing it — within roughly two years of ChatGPT's release. Compare the global picture: our 186-university worldwide audit found 77% with policies, and Global South flagships at just 46%. The R1 census shows what the ceiling looks like when resources and governance capacity are not the constraint.
Every university has its own page
The census as a directory: all 187 R1 universities, one page each — verdict, official policy link, and the exact audit note per university, including the one confirmed holdout.
Download
@dataset{studyintelligence2026r1,
author = {{Study Intelligence}},
title = {US R1 AI Policy Audit 2026},
year = {2026},
publisher = {Study Intelligence (aclas.si)},
url = {https://aclas.si/data/us-r1-ai-policy-audit-2026}
}How it was audited
Each of the 187 institutions in the 2025 Carnegie R1 classification was checked against its official domain for published AI usage guidance or policy — the same protocol as our global audit. One row per university: has_policy (YES / NO / UNCLEAR), policy_url, and scope notes. Snapshot 2026-10-18.
Study Intelligence is a research initiative by ACLAS College.