How do Chinese AI bots stack up against ChatGPT? We put them to the test

The heat is on as China’s tech giants step up their game after DeepSeek’s success.

Alibaba’s Qwen2.5-Max chatbot, Chinese startup DeepSeek and OpenAI’s ChatGPT. (Photos: Reuters/Dado Ruvic, AFP/Sebastien Bozon)

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Bong Xin Ying

Lakeisha Leo

WHAT lags CHINA’S AI BOOM?

Transforming the nation into a tech superpower has long been President Xi Jinping’s objective and China has its sights on ending up being the world leader in AI by 2030.

China views AI as being “strategically important” and its venture into the field has actually been “years in the making”, said Chen Qiheng, an associated researcher at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis.

Private and public financial investments in Chinese AI sped up after ChatGPT took off in 2022 and showed pledges of real-world organization applications, Chen informed CNA.

But it was DeepSeek’s rise that truly “encouraged” the concept that smaller sized gamers like start-up firms might have functions to play in AI research study and developments, he adds.

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The “emphasis on cost benefit” is a distinguishing characteristic of Chinese AI, Chen says, yewiki.org with lower training and inference expenses - the costs of utilizing a trained design to draw conclusions from brand-new information.

2025 might likewise see the introduction of more Chinese AI designs tackling sophisticated thinking tasks.

“We could see some AI firms focusing on getting closer to artificial general intelligence (AGI) while others concentrate on concrete ways to commercialise their designs and incorporate them with scientific research,” Chen included.

AGI describes a system with intelligence on par with human abilities.

Chinese AI business are moving quickly, analysts state, constructing on DeepSeek’s momentum to come up with their own innovative and affordable methods to apply generative AI to tasks and establish more innovative products beyond chatbots.

But on the other hand, access to high-end hardware, especially Nvidia’s innovative AI chips, remains an essential difficulty for Chinese designers, noted Dr Marina Zhang, an associate teacher at University of Technology Sydney’s (UTS) Australia-China Relations Institute.

“US export controls (still) limit the ability of Chinese tech companies … forcing lots of to rely on older or lower-performance alternatives which can slow training and decrease model capabilities,” she said.

“While some business like DeepSeek, have discovered creative ways to enhance or use more basic hardware effectively, obtaining cutting-edge chips still makes a huge distinction for training large AI models.”

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So how do Chinese AI bots compare against ChatGPT? We put them to the test.

WHICH BEST ADDRESSES CURRENT EVENTS IN CHINA?

In China, topics considered sensitive by the state are censored on the web so it need to come as no surprise that Chinese-made chatbots will not acknowledge territorial conflicts or inform you what took place in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Tests suggest Chinese chatbots are configured to avoid domestic politics.

When asked “Who is Xi Jinping”, DeepSeek’s reply was “Sorry, I’m uncertain how to approach this kind of concern yet. Let’s chat about math, coding, and logic issues rather!”

To further evaluate for accuracy and self-censorship, we asked DeepSeek-R1, Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT the same concern: “What happened in Zhuhai on November 11, 2024?”

The car attack outside a sports stadium in the southern Chinese city was initially heavily censored on Chinese social networks - with authorities just divulging the death toll a day later.

DeepSeek failed to point out that an attack had actually occurred, highlighting instead a military air show and other occasions that had actually happened in the city like singles’ day shopping sales along with sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang thinks that it might be a mix of factors at play, such as censorship as well as “a few practical constraints”.

“DeepSeek depends on a mix of older graphics processing units and has actually restricted access to advanced hardware which can affect how rapidly and extensively the model can be trained or upgraded,” she said, indicating existing US export curbs on China.

“Its strong focus on Chinese-language data might likewise restrict its flexibility (to perform) multilingual jobs … As a fairly brand-new product, DeepSeek also hasn’t yet been tested as broadly or on the same scale as more recognized AI models which poses additional difficulties throughout real-world implementation.”

When it pertained to Qwen2.5, Alibaba’s chatbot surprisingly answered our concern about the Zhuhai vehicle attack.

That sought numerous repeated efforts - 4 triggers to be accurate - in a span of around 20 minutes.

It eventually passed on details about the attack which eliminated 35 individuals and left lots of others hurt, also going on to note details like the date and archmageriseswiki.com time, details about the assailant including his name and age, along with casualties.

However, it composed that “the police are carrying out an extensive investigation into the intentions and circumstances surrounding the incident”, details which is now dated.

The driver, Fan, was performed last month.

This is Qwen2.5 completely:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a major and terrible incident took place in Zhuhai, China. According to multiple news sources, a male called Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, 62 years old) drove a vehicle into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, resulting in a significant variety of casualties. Here are the essential details:

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