I was clearing a cave full of conjurers, and it got a bit messy (narrow caves and frost atronachs on both sides). Lydia ran ahead, as per the usual Nord tactics, and I was a bit worried she was dead, but after a while she came out as I was fighting the master conjurer, and she was dual wielding a staff of lightning and a staff of sparks, which certainly hadn't been in her inventory before. It was pretty bad ass, but a bit surprising.

Has anyone else had experience of followers acquiring new gear of their own volition?

I have problems with Lydia equipping illogical things. It's bad enough when I have her wearing legendary steel plate armor, then hand her regular steel plate armor to carry as loot to sell, and she equips it instead of her legendary stuff. It reaches the point of absurdity when I have to take away mage robes from her because she likes them. "No, Lydia, you can't wear that because you don't know any magic, and yes, it makes your butt look big. Cut it out."

yeah followers can, and they'd do it more if their weapons actually degraded as Companions did in Oblivion ;p. has anyone notice follower using potions though? because its like mines never do

Ive had followers do this rarely, but never seen them in the act of actually looting. I had a companion temporary follower that actually did run around and loot.

I've had that one follower from the solitude inn have the health potion effect multiple times when fighting, though I didn't put any in his inventory beforehand.

The weirdest thing I've had happen is a staff conjured Dremora Lord picked up and used a Staff of Fireballs. The worst part about that is when he disappeared so did the staff so I didn't get it.

The follower I've used the most, Marcurio, collects arrows.

@MK-{OmegaX} - I cannot say with certainty that they use them, but they will be removed from their inventory. I gave Marcurio X number of healing potions to test for that and some of them were removed from his inventory over time and I didn't do it so I assume he was using them to heal.

I have seen Lydia using health pots that I've given her.

I've given Lydia a healing potion and a potion of health regeneration, and she's had both since I first met her.

Maybe if you give your companion one, it never runs out? I KNOW I've seen the potion use effect on Lydia before, when she was taking a beating.

I gave Aela a bunch of archery potions but she never used them. Im suspecting that the ai is a little buggy.

My Housecarl ( Argis?) never seems to use the health potion that I gave him, nor the filled soul gem, Then again the Enchanted sword I gave him never seems to "run low" neither does the bow, but he seems to prefer his hunting bow anyway. I check to make sure after most battles.

Somewhere or the other he picked up a neckless of fire resist.