The Transformation of the Architect’s Role in the AI Era: From Creative Generation to Human–AI Collaboration

Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly embedding itself in architectural workflows, reshaping architects’ authority while enabling new human–machine collaborations. This paper traces the technical evolution from parametric tools to multimodal generative platforms, reviews recent scholarship on AI-driven role shifts, conducts case-based analysis of typical design platforms across concept gener-ation, spatial configuration, performance simulation, visualization, and communication. Based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) methodology, representative studies and cases over the past 6 years were sys-tematically searched, and 59 articles related to AI design were included. The results show that, AI has been widely integrated into the workflow of various stages of architectural design, and different types of AI models have formed a collaborative and coupled mechanism in multi-stage tasks. Architects’ roles are transforming along three paths: from form-makers to creative directors who curate prompts and narratives, to system integrators who orchestrate cross-platform workflows, and to ethical supervisors respon-sible for contextual adequacy, social impact, and risk control. AI excels at exhaustive searching, rapid iteration, and optimization, whereas architects remain irreplaceable in defining problems, interpreting ambiguous constraints, and synthesizing cultural and spatial values. Clarifying these task boundaries and capability requirements provides a framework for updating architectural ed-ucation and practice, helping architects reposition themselves as strategic coordinators and value guardians within intelligent, data-driven design ecologies.