The CDP category is graduating to a new phase. Marketers have unprecedented expectations for data as AI utilization explodes and marketing demands sophisticated insights, personalization, cross-channel execution, and measurability. To power the next generation of tools and customer engagement, marketers expect CDPs to provide more than data transit; they expect data utility.

For years, CDPs focused on collecting, unifying, and distributing customer data. Those capabilities still matter. Marketers need robust profiles, precise identity resolution, and broad access to data across channels. And our just-published Forrester Wave™: Customer Data Platforms For B2C, Q3 2026 reveals a market that is moving beyond profile building and audience generation toward decisioning, orchestration, and AI-powered execution.

To address current and future requirements, marketers must consider solutions that:

  • Excel at data ingestion and profile assembly. Top solutions support data-handling capabilities like warehouse-native access, advanced data management and governance features, and multiple matching and identity resolution options for profile assembly.
  • Extend audience generation into customer decisioning. Top solutions support interaction decisioning including out-of-the-box models, real-time triggers, and journey orchestration for multichannel and multi-interaction workflows.
  • Align with evolving AI strategies. Top solutions support multiple AI delivery methods including AI agents, MCP server access, and data platform capabilities like managing a data context layer.

The expanding remit signals a significant and welcome shift in CDP value realization. CDPs are no longer judged solely by the customer profiles they create. They are increasingly evaluated by the decisions they enable. The Wave evaluation highlights a market with multiple viable approaches to the CDP to drive outcomes. Some vendors emphasize broad enterprise ecosystems and extensive activation capabilities. Others differentiate through data quality, composable architectures, or AI functionality. That diversity is healthy because there is no universal best CDP. The right choice depends on an organization’s priorities, existing technology environment, data maturity, and AI ambitions.

The CDP Wave evaluation will help you understand how these 10 vendors stack up against 25 functional and strategy criteria. Readers can also customize the Wave scorecard to reflect their own specific priorities and requirements. To learn more about our Wave findings and Forrester’s best practices for CDPs and marketing technology, please request a guidance session.

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