Each year, the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) releases its annual report summarizing the status and performance of the accredited CME/CE enterprise. The report is a collection of statistics spanning the number of providers, learner interactions, revenue totals, and activity volumes.
For CME/CE leaders responsible for strategy, accreditation oversight, and program evolution, understanding what the ACCME data signal is essential for informed decision-making. Twelve:01 Consulting independently analyzes the ACCME Annual Report each year because trends, not isolated metrics, provide insight as to the future of accredited education. The 2025 ACCME Data Report portrays an enterprise that is financially stronger, increasingly interprofessional, rapidly evolving in education delivery, and beginning to acknowledge the transformative role artificial intelligence will play in accredited learning.
Download Twelve:01’s Analysis of ACCME’s 2025 Data ReportHere are the strategic themes we believe every accredited provider should understand.
What does the 2025 ACCME Annual Report tell us about the overall health of accredited CME/CE?
There were fewer accredited providers in 2025 than in 2024. Total educational activities also declined modestly. Yet nearly every other measure of organizational scale increased.
Total reported income reached an all-time high of $3.85 billion, while learner interactions remained remarkably stable at 57.5 million, despite fewer activities being offered.
Rather than signaling contraction, these data point to a maturing accredited CME/CE enterprise that is generating greater financial value and sustaining learner engagement with fewer providers and educational activities.
Organizations appear to be delivering fewer activities while reaching comparable numbers of healthcare professionals and generating greater financial sustainability. Larger providers continue expanding their operational capacity while smaller organizations increasingly focus on strategic educational offerings rather than sheer volume.
For accredited providers, success is becoming less about how many activities are produced and more about how effectively those activities reach learners and demonstrate value.
Why is Joint Accreditation becoming one of the profession’s biggest growth metrics?
Perhaps the clearest structural trend in the report is the continued expansion of Joint Accreditation.
Joint Accredited providers increased from 187 to 206 organizations, representing more than 10% annual growth. Although Joint Accredited organizations represent only about 14% of accredited providers, they now account for more than half of all accredited activities and approximately 61% of all learner interactions.
The growth of Joint Accreditation is less a new trend than a confirmation that healthcare education has reached an inflection point. As care is team-based, education is evolving to elevate care teams – not individual professions – to improve patient outcomes.
Healthcare depends upon well coordinated teams, not isolated professions. Physicians, nurses, pharmacists, physician associates, psychologists, social workers, and numerous other healthcare professionals now learn together because they practice together in the clinical setting.
The data suggest that interprofessional education has evolved from an emerging trend on the counting education front, to a defining characteristic of today’s accredited CME/CE enterprise. Organizations that currently design education exclusively around physician audiences might consider targeting an interprofessional healthcare team and how this might increase the value of their education.
Are accredited providers becoming more effective with fewer educational activities?
One of the more interesting findings is that activity volume continues to decline modestly while learner engagement remains stable. Although activity volume remains an important operational metric, the 2025 data suggest that learner reach and educational impact may be more meaningful indicators of organizational success.
The data suggest that accredited providers should continue evaluating how educational delivery aligns with evolving learner needs. Formats that are scalable, easily updated, and accessible on demand consistently generate substantial learner engagement, indicating they may be well positioned to support the future of accredited education.
Which CME/CE activity formats are growing fastest?
The ACCME report reinforces a trend that has been developing for several years.
Enduring materials now account for approximately 44% of accredited activities but generate nearly two-thirds of all learner interactions. Live courses remain important but produce only a fraction of overall participation despite representing more than 40% of educational activities.
Even more noteworthy is the performance of Internet Searching & Learning.
Although only 62 accredited activities were reported nationally, this activity type generated approximately 3.66 million learner interactions, producing the highest learner reach per activity anywhere within the accredited system.
While the relatively small number of activities warrants caution in interpretation, the data stands out. Clinicians appear to, increasingly, value education that is integrated directly into clinical workflow rather than requiring separate learning experiences. The profession appears to be moving steadily toward just-in-time education.
What do learner preferences tell us about the future of CME/CE?
The report also reveals noted differences between physician and non-physician learners.
Physicians continue gravitating toward:
- Enduring materials
- Regularly Scheduled Series (RSS)
- Internet Searching & Learning
Other healthcare professionals primarily engage with:
- Enduring materials
- Live courses
- RSS
These differences suggest that educational strategy should be driven by the needs of the intended learner audience rather than by a one-size-fits-all approach to educational formats. While the ACCME data do not explain why these preferences differ, they underscore the value of offering a diverse portfolio of educational formats capable of serving different learner populations. Providers that develop complementary educational experiences, rather than relying on a single activity type, may be better positioned to engage learners across the continuum of care.
What does the changing revenue mix mean for accredited providers?
One of the more interesting data points in the report concerns funding. For the first time, advertising and exhibit income slightly exceeded commercial support as a revenue source across the accredited enterprise. Advertising and exhibits increased nearly 17%, making this a noteworthy growth category as reported by ACCME.
The emergence of advertising and exhibit income as the largest non-registration revenue source should not be interpreted as a decline in commercial support. Rather, it reflects an increasingly diversified financial model in which accredited providers are drawing upon multiple complementary revenue streams.
While the overall funding landscape appears increasingly diversified, that diversification is not experienced uniformly across accredited providers. The ACCME data show that commercial support and advertising/exhibit revenue remain concentrated among a relatively small segment of the enterprise. Only about 30% of providers received commercial support, while fewer than half reported advertising or exhibit revenue. Even among those providers, the median reported income was zero, illustrating that a relatively small subset of organizations accounts for the majority of these funding streams.
For many accredited providers, financial sustainability will continue to depend on developing diversified business models that combine a mix-and-match of registration revenue, sponsorship, membership value, grants, and strategic educational partnerships.
How are accredited providers measuring educational outcomes?
The report confirms continued evolution with education outcomes measurement, but also ongoing opportunity.
Nearly all accredited activities measure learner competence consistent with ACCME expectations. Approximately half assess clinician performance, while a growing proportion attempt to measure patient health outcomes.
The challenge lies in how those outcomes are measured with respect to the credibility and reliability of the data.
Across virtually every outcome level, providers rely predominantly on self-reported learner assessments rather than objective measurement strategies. Effectively, providers do the best they can with available resources, and self-assessment certainly has value.
However, demonstrating actual changes in clinician behavior, healthcare delivery, or patient outcomes does require objective evidence, whenever feasible. Implementing more robust outcomes methodologies often requires additional financial investment and cross-functional collaboration. However, incorporating more objective measures can strengthen accreditation documentation while providing more credible evidence of the impact of accredited CME/CE.
Why is ACCME’s discussion of artificial intelligence especially significant?
Although artificial intelligence (AI) occupies only a mention in the ACCME report, it signals where the profession is heading. ACCME’s explicit reference to AI in its “Looking Ahead” discussion, acknowledges that AI-enabled clinical information systems are likely to accelerate demand for adaptive, point-of-care learning. AI has become an educational strategy discussion.
Today’s accredited CME/CE standards were developed before generative AI, large language models, and AI-assisted clinical decision support became integrated into healthcare workflows. Consequently, providers now face important governance questions:
- How should AI-generated educational content be reviewed?
- How should AI-assisted writing be disclosed?
- How can providers ensure AI-generated material remains independent, evidence-based, and free from commercial bias?
- What policies should govern AI throughout the educational planning lifecycle?
These questions increasingly represent governance challenges, and organizations that establish thoughtful AI policies today will likely be better positioned as accreditation expectations continue evolving.
What should accredited CME/CE providers do next?
Viewed collectively, the 2025 ACCME data point toward five strategic priorities for accredited providers to consider as they for the next generation of accredited CME/CE.
- Continue to prioritize educational reach and measurable impact.
- Continue to expand interprofessional education capabilities as healthcare delivery is team-based.
- Consider investing in enduring, digital, and point-of-care learning models that align education with clinical workflow.
- Look at situations where your organization might strengthen outcomes methodologies by incorporating more objective performance and patient-level measurements.
- Begin developing formal governance structures for AI to position your organization as being ahead of forthcoming regulations.
Looking Beyond the Numbers
Annual reports are valuable because they document where the profession has been.
Strategic analysis is valuable because it helps explain where the profession is going.
The 2025 ACCME Annual Report depicts an accredited CME/CE enterprise that is becoming more efficient, increasingly collaborative, digitally enabled, financially resilient, and beginning to prepare for an AI-enabled future. Those trends extend well beyond annual statistics—they offer a roadmap for how accredited providers can position themselves for long-term success.
At Twelve:01 Consulting, we believe data are most useful when they inform strategy. That is why we independently analyze the ACCME Annual Report each year—not simply to summarize the numbers, but to help accredited providers understand what those numbers mean for their organizations, their learners, and the future of continuing medical education. Our complete analysis of the 2025 ACCME Data Report provides additional trend analysis, practical interpretation, and strategic recommendations for CME/CE leaders.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the biggest trends in the 2025 ACCME Annual Report?
The 2025 ACCME Annual Report highlights several important trends shaping accredited CME/CE. Although the total number of accredited providers and educational activities declined modestly, total learner interactions remained stable at 57.5 million while reported income reached a record $3.85 billion. The report also demonstrates continued growth in Joint Accreditation, increased reliance on enduring educational formats, expanding point-of-care learning, and the ACCME’s first formal acknowledgment of artificial intelligence as an emerging influence on accredited education. These trends suggest an enterprise that is becoming more efficient, increasingly interprofessional, and more digitally integrated.
Why is Joint Accreditation growing so rapidly?
Joint Accreditation reflects the reality that healthcare is delivered by interprofessional teams rather than individual professions. The 2025 ACCME data show that Joint Accredited providers grew by more than 10% in a single year and now produce the majority of accredited educational activities and learner interactions despite representing a relatively small percentage of all accredited providers. Organizations are increasingly recognizing that collaborative education better prepares healthcare teams to improve patient care and system performance.
What do the ACCME data suggest about the future of CME/CE activity formats?
The data indicate that flexibility, accessibility, and workflow integration continue to shape learner preferences – particularly for physician learners. Enduring materials generate the majority of learner interactions, while Internet Searching & Learning (point-of-care education) achieved the highest learner reach per activity of any accredited format. These findings suggest that accredited providers should continue investing in scalable digital learning, longitudinal educational models, and educational experiences that integrate directly into learners’ clinical practice.
How should accredited CME/CE providers respond to the growing role of artificial intelligence?
The ACCME’s inclusion of artificial intelligence (AI) in its 2025 “Looking Ahead” discussion underscores that AI is becoming an important strategic consideration for accredited education. Providers should begin establishing governance policies that address how AI may be used during educational planning, content development, peer review, disclosure management, and quality assurance. Organizations that proactively develop a responsible AI governance framework today will be better positioned to adapt to evolving regulations and technologies that impact accredited CME/CE.
Why does Twelve:01 Consulting independently analyze the ACCME Annual Report each year?
The ACCME Annual Data Report provides valuable data, but numbers alone rarely explain what they mean for the accredited CME/CE enterprise. Twelve:01 Consulting aims to identify long-term trends, interpret their strategic implications, and help CME/CE leaders understand how changes in accreditation, educational delivery, learner engagement, funding, outcomes measurement, and emerging technologies may influence future program planning. Our goal is to help accredited providers move beyond the statistics and make informed, forward-looking decisions that strengthen both compliance and education impact.
