Intuit TurboTax has invested in AI for nearly a decade. In 2026, that plan includes store expansion.
· Business Insider
Nicolas Ortega for BI
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- Intuit said its AI investments generated almost $90 million in efficiencies in the first half of 2025.
- AI use cases include task automation and matching customers with tax professionals.
- An Intuit executive said the company is also investing in physical stores as part of its 2026 strategy.
Intuit began its AI journey in 2019 when Sasan Goodarzi became CEO. A couple of months into the job, he said his biggest challenge was transforming Intuit from a cloud-based parent company of TurboTax and QuickBooks into an artificial intelligence enterprise.
To bring AI features to both Intuit's workforce and customers, Intuit relied on the expertise of C-suite leaders like Chief AI Officer Ashok Srivastava and Chief Technology Officer Alex Balazs, who were hired in 2017 and 1999, respectively. In 2009, Intuit also hired Mark Notarainni, the executive vice president and general manager of Intuit's consumer group, who spoke to Business Insider for this story. All three executives were among a small group of senior leaders who collaborated to set the vision and strategy to leverage AI to make tax filing less stressful, according to an Intuit spokesperson.
At the heart of Intuit's AI endeavors is a data trove from 100 million business and individual customers and a proprietary generative AI operating system used to build and run AI-based apps. While Intuit doesn't publicly disclose how much it invests in AI, the company said its investments have generated nearly $90 million in annualized efficiencies in the first half of 2025.
Ahead of this tax season, TurboTax is expanding a concept it tested last year: a return to the physical world. The company is opening nearly 600 offices and 20 TurboTax-branded storefronts in 2026, merging its AI and machine learning capabilities with human expertise.
If you rewind a decade, you can see how the seeds for this move were first planted.
The tech
In January 2016, TurboTax unveiled SmartLook, which allowed users to get virtual assistance from credentialed tax experts. Revenue for that service, which has evolved over the past decade and is now called TurboTax Live, is still growing: In the fiscal first quarter that ended October 31, 2025, it gained 51% more revenue year over year, according to earnings reports.
Many of Intuit's leaders have long tenures, with Balazs, Goodarzi, Notarainni, and Srivastava collectively spending nearly 67 years at the business software giant. Throughout that time, they've spearheaded key product launches, like the company's Virtual Expert Platform, which debuted in November 2022. It uses AI to understand financial and tax documents and answer customers' questions. When human advice is needed, the platform matches the user with a tax specialist.
In November 2024, the company launched a generative AI-powered financial assistant called Intuit Assist, which can read tax documents uploaded to QuickBooks and display an automated checklist sidebar that reminds customers of any additional forms they may need. Intuit, which processes $105 billion in tax refunds annually on its platform, said this approach automates 93% of its forms.
Though nearly all Americans file their taxes electronically, increased customer use of TurboTax Live — which grew 17% in 2024 and 47% in 2025 — led Intuit to consider a greater emphasis on human-led tax services. Notarainni said the company is now placing a bigger bet on brick-and-mortar.
This article is part of AI Chain Reaction, a series focused on the real-world downstream effects of AI adoption and implementation.
During the 2025 spring tax season, TurboTax piloted 200 expert offices in major metropolitan areas across the country, as well as 20 temporary storefronts in Southern California.
"What we learned during 2025 is there was a large percentage of customers that wanted to meet with us in person," Notarainni said, adding that for some customers, an in-person meeting is necessary to establish trust. He cited in-house research showing that customers searching online for help are five times more likely to book an appointment with a professional expert if they are within a 50-mile radius than those who don't have access to a local tax professional.
Much like Apple didn't replicate Best Buy when it opened its own retail stores, TurboTax wasn't keen to mirror rival H&R Block, which has a massive retail footprint of about 12,000 locations globally. "They reimagined the entire retail experience," Notarainni said of the iPhone maker. "We wanted to do that for taxes and personal finance."
In July, following the launch of the 2025 storefront pilot, Srivastava was appointed Intuit's chief AI officer.
The outcome
TurboTax recently opened a flagship store in New York City's SoHo neighborhood. There are now 20 TurboTax stores, with more to come in major cities like Chicago, Dallas, and Phoenix.
At these locations, all of the tax experts' digital work is conducted on smartphones or tablets, and you won't see a computer atop a single desk, Notarainni said. "It's very warm and inviting," he told Business Insider. "Let our experts focus on you as a customer, not looking into a screen."
Tax filers can come into the store with forms started at home or drop them off to a tax expert, and then either remain in the store to complete the filing or leave and track an expert's progress through a mobile app. An Intuit spokesperson told Business Insider that more of its expert offices and TurboTax stores will open throughout the current tax season, which runs through April 15.
In addition to streamlining massive company processes and shoring up resources for new strategic investments, Intuit's AI investments have changed workflows for its tax associates like Geanna Foreman.
Prior to using AI, Foreman said she would quickly jot down notes during client calls. During the busy tax season, client calls would be back-to-back nearly every day and cause Foreman's work to pile up, she said.
Now, she uses AI-enabled note-taking and post-call summarization tools. "I went from having to make a lot of changes to the notes to now just reviewing them, and they look good, with maybe one or two changes," Foreman said.
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