The Control Engineering survey and report, State of Industrial Automation 2025, created opportunities for additional coverage during the year on automation, controls and instrumentation, supporting the survey results and trends revealed in the report. Think again about what you think you know about automation.
State of Industrial Automation 2025 trends and insights
- Control Engineering helps subscribers think again about State of Industrial Automation 2025 with trends and insights from throughout the year, including how to fill the automation skills gap, smart instrumentation and motion controls.
- Artificial intelligence can bolsters advanced automation and smarter uses of controls boost automation optimization.
- Increased automation connectivity and integration improve cybersecurity responses as additional Control Engineering automation research and discussions continue.
State of Industrial Automation 2025 survey and report from Control Engineering have been supported throughout the year covering trends and topics in automation, controls and instrumentation, as shown more than 40 ways below.
Think again about the state of industrial automation in 2025
The State of Industrial Automation report, spring 2025, analyzes how this dynamic sector is reshaping industries worldwide. This report offers Control Engineering survey results and data analysis, with actionable insights for manufacturers, technology vendors and policymakers striving to thrive in an era of rapid technological change.
Filling the automation skills gap
How to continuously improve careers in automation, controls, instrumentation
Control Engineering Engineering Leaders Under 40 provide great reminders that career development requires measurement, logical decisions and acting upon that knowledge by applying the control loop.
Results are in: Control Engineering Career and Salary Survey, 2025
Benefits and salaries increased. Artificial intelligence and machine learning top the list of leading automation technologies. The economy and workforce shortages are tied among manufacturing business challenges at 38% with taxes and tariffs second at 27%, jumping from 8% last year.
Next-generation automation has arrived: Open, interoperable
New insights: 100-controller ExxonMobil Open Process Automation
ExxonMobil OPA-S Lighthouse Project insights A new ground-up process control system is operating with more than 100 controllers and 1000 input/output (I/O) points at the ExxonMobil Resins Finishing Plant in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, using the Open Process Automation Standard (O-PAS), as described at the 2025 ARC Industry Leadership Forum by ARC Advisory Group.
Shell modernizes refinery control with software-defined automation
Hardware agnostic distributed intelligence of an automation platform is creating a flexible control architecture for manufacturers.
Automate 2025: 10x proven benefits from software
Open automation ecosystems help resolve workforce challenges and provides metrics such as a 50% downtime reduction and a 20% increase in overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) over two years, according to an Automate 2025 keynote presentation.
More answers about how to select the right controller type
System integration experts provide more on “How to select the right controller type for the automation application,” a Sept. 25 Control Engineering webcast, below answering more audience questions than webcast time allowed.
Automate 2025: Machine vision standards update
Multiple global machine vision organizations updated Automate 2025 session attendees on machine vision standards, including the G3 effort to coordinate machine vision standardization.
New SCADA functionality: Improved communications, security, navigation
Discover new features available in modern supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) software. See three phases of a SCADA implementation and SCADA application notes.
New facility: Six net zero benefits, seven smart manufacturing methods
Tour: Understand six benefits to automated, advanced manufacturing and warehousing facility, seven smart factory attributes. Learn about new automated manufacturing, educational labs, sustainability methods. Explore a $100 million automated, advanced manufacturing and motor, VFD and electrical training facility; see six benefits of advanced manufacturing.
Smart instrumentation, digital transformation increases visibility, capability, usability
New smart instruments, wireless for process industry applications
Interview after Weftec provides answers about how process instrumentation and sensors help in process industries including water and wastewater.
Sensing, flow technology insights: Reliability, efficiency, safety
Water and wastewater measurement and flow technologies at Weftec 2025 in Chicago included electromagnetic flow meters, ultrasonic flow meters, Coriolis flow meters, variable area flow meters, ultrasonic level meters, level meters and switches.
How to integrate resiliency into process controls, digital transformation
Accelerating innovation for process controls, digital transformation and automation were among topics at a major industry conference and show. Company executives and customers were among those providing advice.
Electrification, automation trends, markets, safety, motion control
Powering the electric future: Technology, policy and the path ahead
NEMA president and CEO Debra Phillips discussed “Powering the Electric Future: Technology, policy and the path to the next gen energy, manufacturing and grid system” in the opening keynote presentation at SPS Atlanta 2025, covering tariffs, trade, technologies and other topics.
Advantages of multi-axis servo drives in the world of automation
Selecting among technology options in a motion-control application often comes with levels of complexity, especially when dealing with multiple axes. Explore five automation advantages of multi-axis servo drives.
Interactive hazard and operability assessments: 5 ways to safer facilities
How to improve process control safety and risk management? Hazard and operability studies need to integrate sensor data, digital models and safety criteria to optimize plant health. See five components of interactive hazard and operability assessments.
Automate 2025: 5 ways cobots, AMRs top humanoid robots
Collaborative robots and automated mobile robots (AMRs) are more efficient and cost effective for manufacturing and logistics than humanoid robots, which have large opportunities in other applications. See five industrial automation needs and five ways automation helps industry now.
Smarter uses of controls boost automation optimization
Control Engineering helps its audience better apply automation, controls and instrumentation including with tutorials to help with control theory. The long-running series on proportional-integral-derivative tuning is one example. Advance process control and other discussions also are popular.
PID spotlight, part 20: How to tune with sticking control valves
Sticking control valves warp loop-tuning results. Is that a nuisance or a potential disaster? Which way does a sticking valve warp the results and can we compensate? See three things about loop tuning with a sticking control valve.
APC 2.0 spotlight, part 2: Base-layer advanced process control
Base-layer advanced process control provides new capabilities.
How modern MES fits into the fourth industrial revolution
Manufacturing execution systems (MES) are changing the ways in which manufacturers operate in the fourth industrial revolution.
Advice compendium for controls and automation programmers
Industrial controller programmers can hone their control system programming skills for programmable logic controllers (PLCs), programmable automation controllers (PACs), industrial PCs, embedded controllers and edge using extensive advice from two programming experts.
Artificial intelligence bolsters advanced automation
Non-AI advice to stay ahead of AI for industrial automation
ARC Industry Leadership Forum 2025’s theme was “Winning in the industrial AI era.” Think again: Are you smarter than AI? Verify AI answers to be sure.
AI fuels the future cognitive control room
An AI-enabled digital suite that connects platforms, applications and advanced cybersecurity to make plant floor predictions and recommendations.
Smart control systems: Make your AI/ML integration roadmap
Smart water utility control systems and digital transformation: Learn how to apply artificial intelligence and machine learning in the water sector to create the ultimate AI/ML integration roadmap. See eight steps to integrating digital technologies and control systems.
Automate 2025: Robots accelerate; new industrial AI tools help
Artificial intelligence tools are helping reduce factory planning time up to 80% and making robots 40% faster as described in the Automate 2025 keynote presentation, “Industrial autonomy in the era of physical AI.”
How AI-powered video analytics may unify computer vision systems
Artificial intelligence is changing video analytics, computer vision and machine vision systems, but will it unify disparate and incompatible systems, adding more benefits, asks a new ARC Advisory Group report.
Does AI have you on edge? Save up to 15% in control system updates
Artificial intelligence (AI) applications are widely expanding, and process manufacturers have taken notice. Organizations around the globe are already planning ways they can perform powerful AI-based analytics, improving operations and unlocking adaptive advanced process control to drive more autonomous operations and competitive advantages.
How industrial AI deepens sustainability in 3 ways
Benefits include cleaning and contextualizing data for BASF, managing over 200 production facilities and 3 million data streams; and helping Chevron refineries to grow revenues by 38 times through the continuous implementation of optimized supply chain strategies.
Increased automation connectivity, integration improve cybersecurity responses
How to create a physical AI security, safety framework
Explore the security and safety aspects of the emerging industry known as physical artificial intelligence (AI). As physical AI evolves from concept to reality, understanding its implications for human safety and security becomes critical.
Roundtable: Emerging technologies, industrial networks, Industry 4.0
Six industry experts address interoperability, cybersecurity and latency concerns, including the emerging industrial network technologies that may solve some problems for automation, control system applications. Get industrial networking answers from this Control Engineering expert roundtable.
Automate 2025: Benefits, challenges of implementing automation
Learn how to take advantage of automation implementation benefits and overcome or bypass automation challenges, according to advice from Wauseon Machine and Manufacturing, at Automate 2025, by the Association for Advancing Automation (A3).
Automate 2025: System integrators provide automation advice
Automation system integrators provided advice on getting started with automation, digitalization, collaborating on automation projects and more at Automate 2025.
How to mitigate the ongoing Salt Typhoon telecom hack: CISA
Salt Typhoon insights Salt Typhoon telecommunication hack is an ongoing exploitation of AT&T, Lumen, T-Mobile, Verizon and other networks, from a state-sponsored hacking group in October 2024, explained as the worst telecom hack in U.S. history by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) at the 2025 ARC Leadership Forum by ARC Advisory Group.
Private 5G network platform to accelerate manufacturing innovation
Designed for U.S. manufacturing, the industrial wireless platform includes a security framework from the MxD Cybersecurity Institute.
Get some automation optimization advice from system integrators
Automation optimization insights Need to optimize production with automation? Identify bottlenecks, automate where practical and use a data-centric approach throughout. This was among advice system integrator instructors offer in the Jan. 30 webcast, “Automation: System Integrator of the Year Winners look ahead,” from Control Engineering and Plant Engineering, both WTWH Media publications
Global System Integrator Report (with the November/December print/digital editions of Control Engineering and Plant Engineering, with more online) Includes System Integrator of the Years, SI Giants and case studies from automation system integrators about control system integration.
More Control Engineering automation research, discussions continue
Additional Control Engineering research related to The Future of Industrial Automation: 2025 Insights follows below.
Control Engineering 2025 Salary Report
Control Systems: HMI, SCADA & PLCs Report
Motors and Drives: 2025 Research
To help determine topical coverage for the Control Engineering audience, WTWH Media research asks subscribers what they need to do their jobs better. Those results are covered and published in the topical list for 2026.
Control Engineering reveals new 2026 topics from subscriber research
Control Engineering 2026 editorial calendar, determined by subscriber research, is provided in this document. Link to how to contribute
Control Engineering uses metrics to look back monthly providing insights into popular recently posted articles that subscribers may have missed.
Control Engineering hot topics: September 2025
The top articles in Control Engineering this month covered topics like PID tuning, incorporating AI, the Engineering Leaders Under 40 and multi-axis servo drives.
A full-year retrospective using analytics and analysis will determine the best of 2025 early in 2026. Here’s a look back at 2024, which helped shape 2025.
Research: Hot topics in Control Engineering for 2024
In the Control Engineering annual tally of hot topics in industrial automation, controls and instrumentation for articles posted during 2024, the following topics ranked highest based on Google Analytics for www.controleng.com. See also covers, videos and webcast topics of interest.
Finally, providing persistent insights into advanced automation trends shaping controls, the Control Engineering podcasts continue the discussions.
The Downtime | Episode 20: The Prophecy of Productivity
This week on The Downtime podcast, Sarah and Sheri welcome Jonathan Mitchell, senior applications engineer with a major automation provider. Tune in!
Ctrl+Alt+Mfg Ep. 1: Resetting and Rethinking Manufacturing has interviews with industry leaders, system integrators and engineers redefining automation on the plant floor. Topics range from control systems and robotics to artificial intelligence and data analytics.
Mark T. Hoske is editor-in-chief, Control Engineering, WTWH Media, [email protected]. Research and related report were conducted by Amanda Pelliccione, marketing research manager, WTWH Media and Control Engineering. Others on the Control Engineering editorial team contributed including Gary Cohen, Stephanie Neil, Sheri Kasprzak, Sarah Wynn and Puja Mitra.
Keywords
State of Automation 2025, industrial automation trends and insights
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