Banks will say that their customers still visit bank branches for many transactions. Whether it’s Bank of America or HSBC or Fifth Third, almost all banks believe branches will have a role to play for the foreseeable future.

But FIs across the country are shutting down branches at a steady clip, and people who once visited a branch for daily transactions now “visit” digitally. This is not to say branches will become totally obsolete, and they still serve their purpose — but what will the branch of the future look like?

Bank Innovation polled its readers on the matter. Most of the respondents answered that branches will not exist in the future. At all.

Of the 346 readers that took the poll, about 41% (141) said that branches will cease to exist in the future, while 37% (129) said the future bank branch will be an ATM with advanced functionality.

About 15% said that robots will replace human beings in the bank branch. Whether that will happen, no one knows. But it could: HSBC this week unveiled that it would use SoftBank Robotics robot Pepper in its New York headquarters to improve a customer branch experience (more on this here).

And still Pablo Sanchez, regional head of retail banking and wealth management at HSBC in the U.S. and Canada, told Bank Innovation that he believes that bank branches have a long future ahead. Sanchez is not alone. Cathy Bessant at Bank of America echoed a similar sentiment at the CB Insights Future of Fintech conference two weeks ago in New York, and Fifth Third’s Melissa Stevens also expressed a similar point of view to Bank Innovation.

Maybe they are right? According to a study titled, “Delivering Excellent Customer Service: When and How Consumers Prefer Face-to-Face Engagement and What It Means for Banks,” only 6% of adults said they preferred digital-only interactions with their bank, mainly because they want to have “more substantive conversations,” about loans, financial advice, mortgage and large money transfers with a human representative. About 77% of those surveyed said they prefer discussing these topics in person.

But it is equally true that bank branches are steadily being closed. A Wall Street Journal report released earlier this year showed more than 1,700 bank branches were shut down in the 12 months ending in June 2017, deeming it “the longest stretch of closures since the Great Depression.” These closures were attributed to falling foot traffic, the decreasing need for tellers because of ATMs and of course, digital banking.

Bank Innovation’s poll was conducted on its site during the month of June. Want to participate in our next poll? Look to the sidebar at the right.