Optimizely Closes 2025 After Major AI, Content, and Experimentation Advancements; Unveils 2026 Predictions

NEW YORK, December 16, 2025 – Optimizely, the leading digital experience platform (DXP) provider, is closing out one of its most transformative years yet, marked by major advancements across AI, content, experimentation, and analytics. In 2025, the company redefined how digital teams plan, create, and optimize experiences by introducing agent orchestration at scale, strengthening the CMS as the backbone of AI discoverability, and giving brands new ways to measure and improve increasingly nonlinear customer journeys. This momentum is reflected in strong customer adoption, community engagement, and industry recognition throughout the year.

Optimizely Wrapped: 2025 Highlights

Opal: The Future of Agent Orchestration Takes Shape

• Introduced the next evolution of Opal, expanding from an AI assistant into a full agent orchestration platform that can plan, create, and optimize content across the entire digital lifecycle

• Launched more than 28 purpose-built marketing agents, including: GEO Recommendations, Web Accessibility Evaluation, Competitive Insights, GA4 Traffic Report Generation, Content Translation, Heatmap Analysis, and more—each designed to reduce manual tasks and accelerate outcomes

• Reached 900+ active users across marketing and digital teams worldwide, reflecting growing adoption of agent-driven workflows

Content & CMS: A Breakthrough Year for AI-Powered Publishing

• Launched the industry’s first GEO-ready CMS, giving brands page- and site-wide optimization capabilities plus built-in GEO analytics to ensure visibility in the era of AI-driven discovery

• Won the 2025 MarTech Breakthrough Award for Best Content Management Platform, underscoring leadership in AI-enhanced content creation and delivery

• Published new global research on the rise of click-less customer journeys, revealing that 62% of marketers believe AI-driven discovery is already changing how customers find brands

Experimentation & Analytics: Deeper Insights, Smarter Optimization

• Celebrated the one-year anniversary of Optimizely Analytics, now used by dozens of global brands to unify data and uncover opportunities to improve conversion

• Supported customers as they conducted nearly 300,000 new experiments in 2025

Celebrating a Strong Year of Customer & Community Growth

• Hosted the largest Opticon series in company history, with record-breaking attendance across New York, London, and Online, signaling rising demand for AI-ready digital experience solutions

• Welcomed more than 300 new logos across key industries — from retail and manufacturing to financial services and B2B technology

• Received analyst recognition across multiple evaluations, including:

  • The Forrester Wave™: Digital Experience Platforms, Q4 2025
  • The Forrester Wave™: Content Management Systems, Q1 2025
  • The 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Content Marketing Platforms
  • The 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Personalization Engines
  • The 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Digital Experience Platforms

As organizations prepare for another year of rapid transformation, Optimizely’s executive team is also sharing three predictions that will set the agenda for marketers in 2026 — and why the shift toward measurable, operational AI is accelerating.

Looking Ahead: Optimizely’s Top 3 Predictions for 2026

1. AI Pilots Hit a Wall — Only Proven ROI Will Survive: “Marketers will enter what I call POC Purgatory,” said Shafqat Islam, Chief Marketing Officer at Optimizely. “After two years of enthusiasm and experimentation, teams will struggle to scale AI past the pilot phase. The tools that thrive in 2026 will be the ones that deliver measurable ROI in real, messy, day-to-day workflows.”

2. Creativity Becomes the New Competitive Edge: “When every brand uses similar AI models, creativity becomes the ultimate differentiator,” said Tara Corey, SVP of Marketing. “In 2026, the brands that win will combine AI efficiency with daring ideas, emotional storytelling, and experiences that feel unmistakably human.”

3. The Shift from Clicks to Conversations Accelerates: “In 2026, conversational discovery will become the default,” said Nazanin Ramezani. “People will increasingly ask AI to find, compare, and evaluate for them—shifting discovery from clicking through pages to having a conversation. Brands that aren't optimizing their content for answer engines will not get surfaced.”

To see how Optimizely is helping brands prepare for the next era of AI-powered experiences, visit: https://www.optimizely.com/ai/

Forrester Disclaimer
Forrester does not endorse any company, product, brand, or service included in its research publications and does not advise any person to select the products or services of any company or brand based on the ratings included in such publications. Information is based on the best available resources. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. For more information, read about Forrester’s objectivity here.

Gartner Disclaimer
Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Content Marketing Platforms, Jeff Cohen, Rene Cizio, Carlos Guerrero, Nicole Coskren, 11 March, 2025.

Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Personalization Engines, Penny Gillespie, Jason Daigler, Alex De Fursac Gash, Mike Froggatt, Jessica Dervyn, 4 February 2025.

Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms, John Field, Irina Guseva, Mike Lowndes, and Varsha Mehta, 28 January 2025.

GARTNER is a registered trademark and service mark of Gartner and Magic Quadrant is a registered trademark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and are used herein with permission. All rights reserved.

Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.