The United States remained the world’s largest services market and was the world’s leading exporter and importer of services in 2023*, reports the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) in its new publication, Recent Trends in U.S. Services Trade: 2025 Annual Report. The U.S. services sector also continued to be the largest sector of the U.S. economy. 

The USITC, an independent, nonpartisan, factfinding federal agency, compiles the report annually. Each year’s report presents a qualitative and quantitative overview of U.S. trade in services and highlights some of the services sectors and geographic markets that significantly contribute to recent services trade performance.

This year’s report focuses on trade in professional services, including accounting and auditing, advertising, architecture and engineering, education, legal, and management consulting services. The report includes a special topic section on research and development services, as well as two thematic chapters. 

• The first thematic chapter focuses on how skills gaps and the introduction of new technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), are affecting the competitiveness of professional services suppliers. 
• The second indicates how changing demographics, including aging and income growth, in advanced and emerging markets; businesses’ ongoing digitalization; and the move by many manufacturing firms to reorganize their supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic are driving demand for certain professional services after the pandemic.

In recent years, professional services suppliers, such as those listed below, have adopted new technologies to improve productivity, lower costs, and address increased constraints in skilled labor supply.

• Accounting and Auditing Services: Firms are using new technologies and outsourcing or offshoring to improve productivity and lower costs. Firms are reducing the cost of supplying these services by automating and importing lower-skilled tax and auditing functions, while driving revenue growth through higher-value advisory services.
• Architecture and Engineering Services: Firms have had difficulties in hiring and retaining skilled workers, and in response some are offering mentorship, internship opportunities, and flexible work schedules. New technologies like AI, building information modeling, and drone surveillance are increasingly used for design, risk assessment, 3D modeling, and other applications.
• Legal Services: New technologies have led to the growth of lower-priced and more technically sophisticated alternative legal services providers and legal technology companies. U.S. firms supplying legal services in foreign markets are using technology to increase efficiency but are also facing complex regulatory environments.

The demand for professional services in the following sectors reflects changing demographics and expanding digitalization.

• Advertising Services: This industry has seen a sharp decline in demand for linear television content and a sharp rise in demand for video streaming services content. Firms are also seeing growing demand for content developed for social media platforms, and increasingly use AI technologies to target consumers more effectively.
• Education Services: Many U.S. universities have sought to attract international students to boost declining domestic enrollments and offset funding shortfalls. The international branch campuses of some U.S. universities have struggled to enroll enough students or attract adequate financing, with many such campuses closing in recent years. 
• Management Consulting Services: Demand has been driven by the need for assistance in dealing with technological advancements and shifts in workplace habits, along with supply chain optimization and sustainability initiatives. Traditional consulting firms have been impacted by rising competition from IT firms, small niche companies, and freelance consulting platforms.

The USITC hosted its 18th annual services roundtable on October 30, 2024. The discussion, summarized in the report, focused on how widespread workforce gaps and aging demographics are affecting U.S. services industries, how some graduates of U.S. schools and universities are struggling to find employment within the first two years, and how AI is expected to augment or replace many tasks in professional services, among other topics.

Recent Trends in U.S. Services Trade: 2025 Annual Report (Inv. No. 332-605, USITC Publication 5643, July 2025) is available on the USITC website. An interactive dashboard supplements the report.

*The latest year available for cross-border services trade data is 2023; the latest year available for affiliate sales and purchases data is 2022.