TIME Magazine names ‘Architects of AI’ as 2025 Person of the Year – One America News Network

OAN Staff Blake Wolf and Brooke Mallory
3:46 PM – Thursday, December 11, 2025

TIME Magazine named the “Architects of AI” as the 2025 Person of the Year on Thursday, proclaiming that figures like Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and Mark Zuckerberg, among others, changed “our world” in “new and exciting and sometimes frightening ways.”

Jensen Huang (Nvidia), Elon Musk (xAI), Sam Altman (OpenAI), Lisa Su (AMD), Mark Zuckerberg (Meta), Demis Hassabis (DeepMind), Dario Amodei (Anthropic), and Fei-Fei Li (Stanford HAI) are all included in the list.

TIME described their selection of AI leaders as recognizing those who “delivered the age of thinking machines,” transforming society, including in global competition akin to nuclear advancements. The outlet also highlighted the monumental advances and infrastructure built this year thanks to artificial intelligence, particularly as the U.S. races to outpace China in this new era of AI supremacy.

“2025 was the year when artificial intelligence’s full potential roared into view, and when it became clear that there will be no turning back,” TIME wrote in a social media post. “For delivering the age of thinking machines, for wowing and worrying humanity, for transforming the present and transcending the possible, the Architects of AI are TIME’s 2025 Person of the Year.”

TIME’s “Person of the Year” cover art, which depicts all eight AI leaders, is also said to be referencing the famous “Lunch atop a Skyscraper” (1932) photograph. The second cover image depicts scaling scaffolding surrounding metal and electrical components configured in the letters “A” and “I.”

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Explaining the decision, TIME editor-in-chief Sam Jacobs wrote, “We’ve named not just individuals but also groups, more women than our founders could have imagined (though still not enough), and, on rare occasions, a concept: the endangered Earth, in 1988, or the personal computer in 1982.”

“Person of the Year is a powerful way to focus the world’s attention on the people that shape our lives,” Jacobs continued. “And this year, no one had a greater impact than the individuals who imagined, designed, and built AI.”

While the “Architects of AI” ultimately took the honor, the frontrunner for much of the selection process was AI itself. Had it won, it would have marked only the third time a nonhuman received the title — following the personal computer, “Machine of the Year” in 1982, and “Endangered Earth” — “Planet of the Year” in 1988.

While TIME has celebrated the transformative rise of AI, a recent Yahoo/YouGov poll painted a much different picture: with 53% of American poll takers saying they believe AI will ultimately destroy humanity.

“Leading AI companies are working feverishly to replace humans in every facet of life, and they’re not being shy about it,” stated Future of Life Institute executive director Anthony Aguirre. “The impact on our society could be catastrophic if there are no guardrails protecting what’s human, and most important to us,” he added.

This year’s TIME Person of the Year honor for the “Architects of AI” comes hot on the heels of 2024’s selection, President Donald Trump, who was celebrated by the outlet for his political comeback and historic second election to the White House.