South Korea launches AI for All, offering free nationwide access with an 80% domestic-model rule
South Korea has kicked off a nationwide AI initiative that aims to give all 51 million residents free, unlimited access to AI services by the end of 2026. The Ministry of Science and ICT selected three consortiums led by SK Telecom, KT, and Kakao for the “AI for All” project, with a key requirement that 80% of the services must run on South Korean models. The policy rests on the country’s Basic AI Act, which took effect in January 2026, and the AI Action Plan 2026–2028 finalized a month later. The project comes as foreign products dominate consumer adoption in Korea. Wiseapp data for April 2026 showed ChatGPT at 23.45 million monthly active users in the country, followed by Gemini at 8.45 million and Claude at 2.41 million. Domestic models including LG EXAONE, SKT A.X K2, and Upstage Solar remain far behind in user scale. Seoul’s answer is to use public funding, compute, and distribution channels to build a protected user base for local AI providers rather than trying to outmatch U.S. and Chinese frontier models directly. The government has allocated 512 NVIDIA B200 GPUs to the three consortiums this year, with operating costs set to be covered by the national budget from 2027 and free access promised through at least 2028. Still, major questions remain over user retention, limited compute relative to global leaders, and the absence of major domestic players such as Naver and Samsung.
