Artificial intelligence (AI) is changing all areas of medicine. The objective of this work was to summarize the current status of AI in surgical oncology and provide an overview of future research topics. To this aim, a literature review was performed and a selection of important research topics, including results of the authors’ own work, was presented. It was found that there is a lot of basic research on AI in surgical oncology, but little clinical translation to date. In the future, the tactile internet will enable democratization of surgical expertise in different facets. In this context, robotic surgery plays an important role for standardization and automation of surgical subtasks, but also as a source of data. Generalist surgical AI could improve how we interact with large bodies of information. Skill assessment has the potential to make surgical training faster and safer. Close collaboration between surgeons and engineers is essential for clinical translation.