Starting in the 1950s, people met to discuss the possibilities of artificial intelligence, a topic that today is of major interest to almost everyone. Although vendors show many AI products at general-purpose technology trade shows such as CES in Las Vegas, following are shows specialized for AI. See
technology trade shows.
Early Discussions (1956 and 1987)
The first meeting that considered AI as a field of its own was at Dartmouth College in 1956 (see
Dartmouth Conference). The second, which has been held every year since 1987, is the Conference and Workshop on Neural Information Processing (see
NeurIPS).
Singularity Summit (2006)
An annual conference held from 2006 to 2012 and alternating between California and New York was sponsored by the Singularity Institute for AI (SIAI) at Stanford University, later renamed Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI). In 2012, Silicon Valley-based Singularity University (SU) acquired the Summit and has hosted the conference in California and locations around the world including India and Spain.
Google I/O (2008)
Google's annual conference, which began in 2008, is increasingly announcing AI additions to its many software products. The 2025 conference showcased the new AI Mode in Google Search as well as AI enhancements in Google software (see
Google I/O).
GPU Technology Conference (2009)
In 2009, NVIDIA held its first GTC in San Jose, California. It featured gaming and also how GPUs could be used for high-performance computing. Today GTC draws more than 20,000 attendees who are very interested in AI, although gaming is still a major topic (see
GTC conference).
Open Data Science Conference AI (2015)
ODSC AI debuted in Boston. Called the Number One AI builder's conference, ODSC AI offers workshops, hands-on training and strategic insights into AI development (see
ODSC AI).
AI Safety (2017)
In 2017, guidelines were developed for AI at California's Asilomar Conference Grounds and at an AI safety conference in the U.K. in 2023 (see
Asilomar Conference on Beneficial AI and
AI Safety Summit).
Ai4 (2018)
This business-focused AI show began in Brooklyn, New York in 2018 (see
Ai4 conference).
C3 AI (2019)
A leading vendor of enterprise AI, C3 AI has held annual conferences in California and Florida since 2019 (see
C3 AI Transform).
COSM Conference (2019)
AI is the major topic in George Gilders's COSM conferences starting in 2019. The 2026 conference is held in Scottsdale, Arizona. Prior to COSM, the Gilder/Forbes Telecosm conferences from 1997 to 2006 covered the latest in high tech. See
Gilder Group.
HumanX (2025)
A conference focused entirely on AI was held in Las Vegas in 2025 (see
HumanX).