Call screening to in-call agent: Can voice be AI's next growth frontier?

From Jio Call Agent to AI-powered call screening, artificial intelligence is becoming an active participant in phone conversations, raising questions around trust, transparency and human interaction

For years, the phone call remained one of the few corners of the digital world untouched by artificial intelligence. AI transformed search engines, powered chatbots, wrote emails and generated images. However, when it came to voice conversations, the experience was still largely the same: one person speaking to another. That is beginning to change.

 

At Reliance Industries' 49th Annual General Meeting (AGM), Jio unveiled Jio Call Agent, an AI-powered assistant that can join live calls, transcribe conversations, generate summaries, set reminders and even perform tasks on behalf of users, bringing AI directly into the conversation itself.

 

The launch reflects a much larger shift underway across the technology industry. As AI tools become more capable, companies are increasingly turning to voice as the next major frontier, betting that conversations could become as important to AI adoption as search boxes and chat windows were over the past decade.

 

 

Businesses see opportunities to cut costs and improve efficiency, while consumers are being introduced to a future where phone calls may no longer involve just two people.

 

What is Jio Call Agent and how does it work?

 

At Reliance Industries' 49th AGM, Reliance Jio unveiled Jio Call Agent, an AI-powered assistant designed to work within live phone conversations. Activated with the voice command "Hey Jio", the assistant can transcribe calls, identify speakers, generate summaries, create reminders and perform tasks without requiring users to switch apps or leave the call.

 

Built directly into the calling experience, the assistant remains available throughout a conversation and operates with user consent, according to the company. Its core function is to capture and organise information by generating transcripts, highlighting key discussion points, and creating post-call summaries and action items.

 

Jio has also equipped the service with conference-calling capabilities. The assistant can identify up to 10 participants, generate speaker-wise transcripts, and even add missing participants to an ongoing call. The company says the service will support 22 Indian languages.

 

Beyond note-taking, Jio envisions the assistant as a voice-based task manager. Users may be able to schedule meetings, set reminders, book cabs, reserve restaurant tables or place orders without interrupting a conversation. The service is expected to launch later this year.

 

Its success, however, will depend on how well it performs in real-world conditions. Handling regional accents, background noise, overlapping speech and multilingual conversations remains a challenge for even the most advanced AI voice systems.

 

Can voice becoming AI's next frontier

 

After transforming search, productivity software and customer support, AI companies are now turning their attention to voice.

 

According to market research firm Precedence Research, the global voice and language intelligence market was valued at more than $20 billion in 2025 and is projected to exceed $145 billion by 2035. The growth is being driven by advances in speech recognition, natural language processing and increasingly capable AI voice agents.

 

Meanwhile, voice AI platform Ringly reported that voice-agent usage grew ninefold in 2025, with production deployments increasing by 340 per cent, a sign that businesses are moving beyond pilot projects and deploying AI voice systems in real-world operations.

 

The logic behind voice AI is compelling.

 

For consumers, speaking is often quicker and more intuitive than navigating apps or typing queries. For businesses, it offers an opportunity to handle large volumes of interactions without proportionately increasing costs.

 

What is the business case behind AI-powered calls

 

The strongest push for voice AI is coming from enterprises managing large volumes of customer interactions, including banks, telecom operators, insurers, airlines and ecommerce companies that collectively field millions of calls daily. Staffing those interactions entirely with human agents is expensive and difficult to scale.

 

According to Ringly's benchmarking data, handling an inbound customer call through a human agent costs between $7 and $12. It suggests the same interaction can be handled by an AI voice agent for roughly $0.40, highlighting the significant cost savings driving enterprise adoption of voice AI.

 

Research firm Gartner estimates that conversational AI could reduce contact-centre labour costs by up to $80 billion globally by 2026. Meanwhile, studies by Forrester Consulting suggest that companies deploying AI-powered voice systems are seeing tangible returns through faster issue resolution, lower operational costs and round-the-clock customer support.

 

Unlike human agents, AI systems do not need breaks, shifts or additional hiring during peak demand periods. They can handle routine queries at any hour while maintaining consistent responses across interactions.

 

That combination of lower costs and higher availability explains why voice AI adoption is accelerating across industries.

 

Why are telecom and banking leading adoption

 

Telecom and financial-services companies are among the earliest adopters of voice AI for practical reasons. First, they deal with enormous call volumes. India's telecom sector serves more than a billion mobile subscribers, generating millions of customer-support interactions daily. AI-powered voice assistants can handle routine requests such as bill payments, recharge reminders, account enquiries and service updates.

 

Second, these sectors operate under strict regulatory requirements. Every customer interaction must often be recorded, documented and auditable. AI systems can provide consistent responses while maintaining detailed logs of conversations and actions.

 

Third, voice remains the most accessible digital interface for many users. While smartphone adoption has expanded rapidly across India, digital literacy levels vary considerably. Speaking in a local language is often easier than navigating an app or website.

 

This is why multilingual voice AI is gaining traction among telecom operators, banks, insurers and public-service platforms.

 

Do consumers still prefer human agents

 

Businesses may be enthusiastic about voice AI, but consumers remain more cautious.

 

A study by AnswerConnect found that preference for speaking with a human agent increased between late 2025 and early 2026, while willingness to interact with AI declined. Similarly, research by Metrigy found that a large majority of consumers still prefer dealing with a person even when an AI system can successfully resolve their issue.

 

The reasons are relatively straightforward. People trust humans more when dealing with complex, sensitive or emotionally charged situations. Complaints, billing disputes, financial issues and service failures often require empathy, judgement and flexibility — qualities consumers still associate more strongly with people than machines.

 

That does not mean consumers reject AI altogether. Many are comfortable using AI for routine tasks such as appointment scheduling, order tracking, status updates and basic information requests.

The dividing line appears to be complexity. The more personal or nuanced the issue, the more likely people are to want a human on the other end of the call. 

 

Why is trust becoming a major challenge for voice AI

 

The trust challenge around AI-powered voice calls is no longer theoretical. As AI-generated voices become more realistic and easier to deploy at scale, regulators in India and globally are grappling with a fundamental question: How do people know whether they are speaking to a human or a machine?

 

The urgency is amplified by the scale of the problem. According to the 2025 India Insights Report, Indian mobile users received more than 4,168 crore spam calls over the past year. AI adds a new layer of complexity by enabling highly scalable robocalls, realistic voice cloning and increasingly sophisticated fraud attempts.

 

India's regulatory framework is evolving in response. In 2025, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) strengthened anti-spam regulations by tightening rules for telemarketers, extending complaint windows, and requiring greater oversight of robocalls and automated dialling systems.

 

The regulator has also introduced dedicated number series for transactional and service-related calls from banks and financial institutions, as well as promotional calls, making it easier for consumers to distinguish legitimate service calls from promotional or potentially fraudulent ones.

 

However, a key challenge remains unresolved. While these measures help verify the origin of a call, they do not necessarily tell consumers whether the voice on the other end belongs to a human agent or an AI system.

 

To address this gap, India's emerging AI governance framework places increasing emphasis on transparency, disclosure and informed consent when AI interacts directly with consumers.

 

Globally, regulators are moving in the same direction. The European Union's AI Act, which becomes enforceable from August 2026, requires organisations to clearly disclose when users are interacting with AI systems.

 

The principle is straightforward: people should know they are speaking to a machine before sharing information or making decisions.

 

For businesses deploying AI voice agents, compliance is becoming a product requirement rather than a legal afterthought. The ability to clearly identify AI interactions, obtain consent and explain how voice data is used may ultimately prove as important as the technology itself.

 

As AI becomes a participant in more conversations, transparency could become the foundation on which consumer trust is built.

 

How has AI already entered phone calls

 

Jio Call Agent may be among the most ambitious attempts yet to bring AI into live conversations, but the technology has already been quietly making its way into phone calls.

 

Over the past few years, smartphone makers and service providers have introduced AI-powered features that help users screen, summarise and manage calls.

 

On Android, Google's Call Screen can answer unknown calls on a user's behalf, ask callers why they are calling, and display a real-time transcript before the user decides whether to pick up. Google has also expanded its call-related AI toolkit with features such as Call Notes, which automatically generate conversation summaries, and Scam Detection, which alerts users to potential fraud attempts.

 

Apple is taking a similar approach. With iOS 26, the company introduced features such as Call Screening and Hold Assist, allowing users to view AI-generated transcripts of incoming callers and avoid waiting on hold.

 

Together, these tools reflect a broader shift towards AI handling routine communication tasks in the background.

 

Beyond smartphones, AI voice technology has already become commonplace in customer service. Banks, telecom operators, airlines and public-service platforms increasingly rely on voice bots to answer routine queries and handle basic transactions.

 

Will AI replace human call agents

 

The conversation around voice AI is often framed as a contest between humans and machines. In practice, the future is likely to be far more collaborative.

 

Most organisations deploying voice AI today use it to handle routine tasks such as account enquiries, appointment scheduling and status updates, while more complex issues are routed to human agents. AI excels at speed, consistency and scale. Humans remain better equipped to navigate ambiguity, exercise judgement and respond to emotionally charged situations.

 

This division of labour is already taking shape across customer-service operations. As AI becomes more capable, it is expected to handle a growing share of repetitive interactions, freeing human agents to focus on cases that require problem-solving, empathy or negotiation.

 

Rather than replacing workers outright, the technology is increasingly being deployed as a support layer that augments human capabilities.

 

Jio Call Agent reflects a similar philosophy. The assistant is designed to assist users by capturing information, organising discussions and helping complete tasks in the background.

 

The larger question is not whether AI can participate in conversations, but whether people are willing to trust it enough to do so.

 

The future of voice AI may not be about replacing human conversations. Instead, it may be about reshaping them, with AI acting as an assistant that listens, remembers and acts when needed.

 

The technology has already entered the call. What remains uncertain is how comfortable people will be sharing the conversation with it.