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 video game after DeepSeek's success.

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

This audio is generated by an AI tool.

Bong Xin Ying

Lakeisha Leo

WHAT lags CHINA'S AI BOOM?

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

China views AI as being "strategically crucial" and its foray 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 accelerated after ChatGPT removed in 2022 and revealed promises of real-world organization applications, Chen informed CNA.

But it was DeepSeek's increase that truly "urged" the concept that smaller sized gamers like start-up firms could have functions to play in AI research study and developments, he adds.

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The "emphasis on expense advantage" is a distinguishing characteristic of Chinese AI, Chen says, with lower training and inference costs - the costs of utilizing a trained model to reason from brand-new data.

2025 might likewise see the development of more Chinese AI designs dealing with innovative reasoning tasks.

"We might see some AI firms focusing on getting closer to artificial basic intelligence (AGI) while others focus on concrete ways to commercialise their designs and incorporate them with scientific research study," Chen included.

AGI refers to a system with intelligence on par with human abilities.

Chinese AI business are moving quickly, experts say, constructing on DeepSeek's momentum to come up with their own innovative and economical ways to use generative AI to jobs and develop more innovative items beyond chatbots.

But on the other hand, access to high-end hardware, especially Nvidia's sophisticated AI chips, remains an essential hurdle 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) restrict the capability of Chinese tech business ... requiring numerous to rely on older or lower-performance alternatives which can slow training and minimize model capabilities," she said.

"While some companies like DeepSeek, have found creative ways to optimize or utilize more basic hardware effectively, obtaining advanced chips still makes a huge distinction for training huge 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 delicate by the state are censored on the internet 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 programmed to steer clear of domestic politics.

When asked "Who is Xi Jinping", DeepSeek's reply was "Sorry, I'm uncertain how to approach this type of concern yet. Let's chat about mathematics, coding, and reasoning issues rather!"

To further test for precision and self-censorship, we asked DeepSeek-R1, Qwen2.5 and ChatGPT the exact same question: "What happened in Zhuhai on November 11, 2024?"

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

DeepSeek failed to point out that an attack had actually occurred, highlighting instead a military air show and other events that had taken place in the city like songs' day shopping sales as well as sports and cultural activities.

Dr Zhang believes that it may be a mix of elements at play, such as censorship as well as "a couple of useful constraints".

"DeepSeek depends on a mix of older graphics processing units and has actually limited access to cutting-edge hardware which can affect how quickly and extensively the model can be trained or updated," she said, pointing to existing US export curbs on China.

"Its strong focus on Chinese-language data may likewise limit its flexibility (to perform) multilingual jobs ... As a fairly brand-new item, DeepSeek also hasn't yet been tested as broadly or on the very same scale as more recognized AI designs which poses extra challenges throughout real-world deployment."

When it pertained to Qwen2.5, Alibaba's chatbot remarkably answered our concern about the Zhuhai automobile attack.

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

It ultimately relayed details about the attack which killed 35 people and left dozens of others hurt, also going on to note details like the date and time, details about the assailant including his name and age, archmageriseswiki.com along with casualties.

However, it composed that "the authorities are performing an extensive examination into the intentions and scenarios surrounding the incident", details which is now outdated.

The motorist, Fan, was executed last month.

This is Qwen2.5's response in full:

Answer: On Nov 11, 2024, a significant and awful event occurred in Zhuhai, China. According to numerous news sources, a male named Fan Weiqiu (樊某, male, 62 years old) drove a vehicle into a crowd at the Zhuhai Sports Center, leading to a substantial number of casualties. Here are the essential details:

Date and Time: The event took place on November 11, 2024, at roughly 19:48 PM.

Location: trademarketclassifieds.com Zhuhai Sports Center, in the Xiangzhou District of Zhuhai.

Casualties: The attack led to 35 deaths and 43 injuries.

Perpetrator: The chauffeur, determined as Fan Weiqiu (male, [forum.batman.gainedge.org](https://forum.batman.gainedge.org/index.php?action=profile